Back in Your Hole!
by CLWiosna
Summary: On the 31st of October, the dead have risen from their graves...and they aren't too happy. Now, Mio and the rest of the Light Music Club have to survive against the zombie apocalypse, against impossible odds. DISCONTINUED.
1. Dead Rising

**A/N**: After a long as freak absence, I am back with a Halloween themed K-On! Fanfiction! I probably should have posted this up earlier so that I could get the finale for this out on the actual day of Halloween, but I don't even have the ending exactly planned out yet. Oh well, this'll probably be my top priority for now and then I'll continue the other two. Until then, I hope you enjoy this!

Rated M just in case for any later events.

**Disclaimer: **I do not own K-On! ! Or K-On! Or K-ON! ! Or K-ON! Don't know if the "n" is capitalized or not but either way, I don't own it.

* * *

A cold wind blew throughout the cemetery, chilling anybody unfortunate enough to be walking by without proper warming clothes. One such person seemed ill-equipped to be out on such a windy night like tonight, mostly because she only wore a T-shirt and pants, with a thin black cloak surrounding her body. The hood of the cloak covered the majority of her face, only revealing tidbits of dark blue hair. This little gusty weather wasn't going to stop this girl from achieving her goal.

Her cloak violently shook due to the windy conditions, making the scene all the more ominous. With the moon shining brilliantly in the night, it enlightened the many graves of the deceased. Scanning across various tombstones, the girl kept walking past each of them until she came across a certain one. She had stayed emotionless the whole night but now, a small smirk could be seen on her face if one looked close enough.

"Finally…" she said, her words almost drowned out by the wind.

She suddenly began chanting a foreign incantation. What would sound like gibberish to one would be known as a forbidden ritual to another. Her lips formed each syllable quickly, her eyes closed and hands clasped together. The gusty conditions began to pick up the more she got into her incantation. The trees began to sway due to the paranormally strong winds. When she finished, all became silent for a moment. It was as if time stopped at that instant.

Then, she felt the ground shake and buckle beneath her. "Yes…rise…" And rise they did. The grave in front of her now had a protruding arm sticking out of the ground. It looked devoid of any life, yet it still moved. Soon, its other hand popped out of the ground, trying to drag the rest of itself out from the ground below. It took a few moments but soon enough; the remaining carcass of that human had risen from the dead, as if it was one of those cliché horror movies.

More arms followed suit of the first person, and soon dragged their own lifeless bodies out of the ground. The small smirk now stretched out into a huge smile.

Instead of the winds that had previously filled the air, the groans of the many undead now echoed throughout the graveyard.

"I can't believe this actually worked…" the girl said. "Mom…I chose you to rise from the ground first because I wanted you to see that I fulfilled your lifelong goal of raising the dead." She motioned her arm to the many bodies, most didn't have many limbs. "You see, this can only occur on the night of the 31st of October, on a full moon. Unfortunately, you did not know that. But now, under my leadership, we shall rule the world with the power of the undead!" she yelled into the sky, her plans becoming more and more cliché.

Instead of being answered by a nod or any sign of agreeing, all that emitted from the girl's mother was an angry groan. The girl looked at her mother in surprise, seeming to understand what that groan meant. The occult member's screams of pain echoed louder than any of the zombie's groans as her arm was bitten by her undead mother. Her seemingly flawless plan wasn't as flawless as she thought. The girl's body lay there on the ground, her limbs flailing in extreme pain. _Yeah…this so didn't go according to plan..._she thought. _Man…Mom's gonna be mad when she finds out Dad got a new wife._ With that odd thought being her last, the Occult Club member passed out and lay there on the ground, as the undead headed toward the nearby city.

_

* * *

_

The next day…

"Ah, Mugi-chan, this cake is one of the best ones ever!"

"Thank you, Yui-chan!"

"Oi Mio, is that blood on your pencil?"

"AH! Where?"

"Shouldn't we be practicing…?"

It was another normal Friday afternoon practice session for Sakura High's Light Music Club. Well, maybe not exactly a practice session. The only person who desired to practice was Azusa; unfortunately, every one of the other members was too wrapped up in their own conversations to let the thought pass through their mind. Inwardly sighing, Azusa gave in yet another day of not practicing and joined the other four for tea and sweets.

"Thank you," she said to Tsumugi as she handed Azusa her signature cat tea cup. Tsumugi gave her usual sincere grin before proceeding to take a bite out of her own biscuits as well.

"Azu-nyan, I knew you'd come around eventually~" Yui cooed.

"Uh, it's just because I didn't want to let my cake go cold!" she retorted.

"Hehe, cakes still taste good when they're cold." The kouhai blushed at her horrible comeback and ate in silence for the next few minutes. In those few minutes, Mio and Ritsu were having an engaging conversation.

"Have you ever heard of the game _Left 4 Dead_, Mio?" Ritsu asked.

The black haired girl shuddered at the menacing title, already afraid of what it would be about. "N-no...no, I haven't…" she replied, fear obviously present in her voice.

"Oh! I'm sure you'll like this game, Mio! It has tons of things you like…like zombies that want to eat your brains out and blood…LOTS AND LOTS OF BLOOD!" Putting a huge amount of emphasis on those last few words, she succeeded in giving her best friend the daily fright of the day.

"You idiot!" Which, of course, resulted in Ritsu gaining a huge bump on her head. "You should really consider taking boxing as a career choice, Mio…" she muttered silent enough so Mio wouldn't hear it.

While Mio and Ritsu were having their conversation, Tsumugi was trying to find the perfect point to enter it. However, she found no golden opportunity to join their conversation. _I have to think of something that will get everybody's attention…but what? Oh think Tsumugi, think! _The Ojou-sama looked around the room, desperately searching for something that would interest the members. Her eyes finally wandered to the whiteboard, more specifically to the date. _October 31__st__…Oh! I got it!_

"Has anybody heard of Halloween?"

Everybody ceased their talking. For a short moment, there was utter silence as the other four members stared at Mugi. Finally, Yui spoke up.

"What's Halloween?" she asked with wonder very apparent on her face.

"Yui, you don't know what Halloween is?" Ritsu gave her a look that made it seem like it was something everybody in the world should know.

"Don't be so surprised Ritsu," Mio joined. "Not all of the Japanese have heard of Halloween. Besides…" Her body began to shudder. "Halloween is a horrible holiday…"

"What the heck is Halloween?" Yui asked again, her voice louder than before.

"Yui-senpai, Halloween is an American holiday," Azusa stated. Everybody stopped their conversation and focused on her. "It's a time where people dress up in scary costumes and knock on people's doors for sweets."

"Scary costumes? Like what?"

"Let me take care of this Azusa!" Ritsu held her thumb up. "I'm the expert in this sort of thing!" Azusa gave her a crestfallen look but let her continue anyway.

"Yui…" her voice became very ominous and eerie. "This a time where people dress up in their scariest costumes ever!" Her eyes now wandered to Mio, the latter looking away in horror of what she would say to scare her further. "They dress up as things like zombies!"

Right on the first syllable of the word "zombies", Mio already huddled into her corner, hugging her knees tight to her chest. She placed her hands firmly over her ears in a desperate attempt to drown out Ritsu's voice. However, Mio could still hear her no matter how hard she cupped her hands.

"They also dress up as vampires, witches, and ghosts!"

"Okay Ricchan, I think I get the point…and I think Mio-chan gets it too…" Yui now stared at Mio's quivering figure. No matter what the other three said, there was no stopping Ritsu's scaring spree on Mio.

Slowly, she crept up behind Mio's trembling figure, her mouth right beside her ear. "And of course…" she whispered quietly. "THEY DRESS UP AS BARNACLES!"

Mio's shrieks of terror could be heard all the way from the graveyard on the outskirts of the town. "YOU FUCKING IDIOT!"

She then proceeded to give her best friend the biggest bump her head would allow to protrude from it.

"Mio-senpai…" The bassist looked around and wondered why the rest of the club was looking at her weird. With a small click in her brain, she realized why. _I just cussed at Ritsu…_

"Mio-chan, just calm down. I'll go get you some special tea my mom taught me to make!" Mugi spoke, trying to make the situation seem less hostile.

All the raven haired girl could do was just stand there, stunned at her previous actions. Even when Ritsu retorted back at her heatedly, she didn't even pay the girl any attention.

Angry amber met with empty grey.

Waving her arms, shoving her slightly, and flicking her forehead all proved ineffective at breaking the girl out of her trance. Shrugging, she walked back to the table and drank her tea as if nothing had happened. The rest of them obliged to do so but eventually went along with it.

_Never in my life have I cussed at Ritsu, or anyone for that matter! Well, maybe at Mama and Papa a few times but other than that, no! What's wrong with you today Mio?_ With her mind a jumbled mess, she excused herself to go take a nice refreshing walk outside. The sun was beginning to wane into the mountains far away, and the wind lightly brushed against her hair: the perfect setting to think about what she did.

* * *

When she exited the school building, she noticed a few peculiar sights. While cornering the sidewalk around the school, she noticed a man vomiting straight onto the street. He was really blowing chunks onto the road that people would drive on. Mio felt like throwing up herself just at the sight of that but was able to hold the consumed cake inside her throat. Upon further inspection of said man, however, she noticed how pale his skin was, and it didn't look natural at all. Lotion probably hadn't been a necessity for this man, as his skin showed many wrinkles, along with cuts and bruises everywhere. As if that wasn't enough to make a normal person book it, there was something wrong about his left eye. _It wasn't there._ At this point, Mio didn't bother to look at any other parts of the man, for it was beginning to be too much for her.

She power-walked toward the nearest trash can and let her insides break out of throat into the waste bin. _That man looked terrible! He didn't look like he was alive at all!_ Suddenly, someone's voice popped into her mind. _Zombies!_ Her mouth formed a scowl as she instantly recognized the voice: Ritsu's. However, she also took some comfort in this as well. It WAS the day after Halloween, and there were bound to be some Japanese people who would still dress up in Halloween attire afterwards. With that thought now planted in her head, she shrugged off the zombie-like guy as someone who was in a costume.

Now around the back of Sakuragaoka, she noticed other abnormal sights. The majority of the men and women around her held that same sickly pale skin color the other man had. No, scratch that, _all _of the men and women were pale as vampires. Now feeling a bit creeped out, Mio started to walk away from the zombie-like residents.

Turning her head around, she bumped into another boy with an undead appearance. Worms were crawling out of his right ear, his other ear seemed like someone took a bite out of it. Scratches around both cheeks of his face gave the impression of him having whiskers. The boy's arms were the only limbs that weren't that pale white. Instead, they gave off that color of dried up blood. By now, Mio was completely terrified as hell.

He then released a groan that sounded extremely inhuman, and then lunged for Mio's face with his jaws wide open. His horrible breath was making her eyes burn furiously. Using her reflexes from playing bass, she smacked the boy's head away, emitting a cracking noise that was likely his neck. Grudge-style, he turned his head slowly back towards her.

Now officially scared as fuck, she forgot about taking the path around to the front entrance and climbed the gates. She sprinted straight toward the building where the clubroom was at. _What the hell was that?_ was all she think as she ran to her sanctuary. Upon opening the double doors, a familiar girl's arm reached for her own, her teeth looking severely savage.

Mio let out a huge shout, and slapped her classmate across the right cheek. Tearing her arm free of her grasp, she ran upstairs. But not before bowing and apologizing despite the situation.

"Sorry Ichigo!" she yelled toward her classmate, and then the bassist continued toward the only place she would feel safe at. _Okay, this is all a big dream! Yeah! The rest of the school and neighborhood is playing a big prank on us by dressing up as scary zombies! Mhm! That must be it!_ she thought, her mind trying its best to reassure herself they were not…what she thought they were.

Unfortunately, her last hope that this was all a prank was immediately dispelled when she spotted other classmates in a hallway. She noticed the obvious limbs missing from the students, blood splattered all over their uniforms. Letting out a small shriek was all it took to alert every student in that hallway. Cursing herself for that, she sprinted for the stairs. The girls were on the other end of the hallway, sprinting towards Mio with mouth agape. _Run faster, damn it!_ she thought to herself. Her feet carried her body across the wooden planks faster than they would ever in the rest of her life as she booked it up the stairs.

Barging into the clubroom, the first thing she did was lock the doors. Breathing heavily from the immense amount of running she had to do today, she began to explain to her friends what was going on down there.

"Everybody, you can't believe what I just saw, it seems that everybody all turned into…" she couldn't finish her sentence as her eyes wandered around the clubroom. She noticed the absence of the two guitars that were usually laid nearby the whiteboard. _No…_she thought. Looking onto the couch, there lay only one school bag. It was hers. And _only_ hers. _No!_ Now bringing her eyes to the chairs, she found that the only thing occupying them was the air.

"NO!" she screamed at a dynamic louder than 3 forte's put together. The rest of them had already _left. _The only reason she headed toward the clubroom was so that she wouldn't feel so alone in this kind of situation. If these really were…what she thought they were, at least she would be with her friends in their final hour. But they were long gone.

Walking to the chair, she broke out and began to bawl as loudly as she could, a small part of her hoping someone would hear her cries of sadness. However, no such person would even pay attention to the screams of others in this situation. As much as Mio didn't want to accept it, she had no other choice than to do so.

"It's a full zombie apocalypse!"

Continuing to let the salty water escape from her eyes, she then noticed a note near the seat where Ritsu would usually sit. Wiping her tears away so the paper would actually be readable, she read the short letter aloud.

"Dear Mio, we decided to leave and head to Yui's house to throw a Halloween party! I texted you a million times but you didn't reply so I just left this note here if you ever came back."

Pulling out her phone, she noticed the many texts Ritsu sent her. Mio, being too focused on not getting her body bitten by a zombie, closed her phone and read the rest of the letter.

"Okay, look. I'm sorry for scaring you so much today. You just make it too easy! Haha, can't believe I can say this without getting hit right now. Well, you'll probably hit me once you go to Yui's house. Or, if you'll go to her house. Kinda wouldn't blame ya if you hate me for what I did back there and wouldn't go cuz of it. I'm sorry Mio…"

Tears of a different emotion began to well up in her eyes, and they eventually made it down to the floor. _Ritsu…_After taking a few moments to wipe away the rest of the fresh tears, she finished the rest of it.

"Well, if you don't hate me enough that you wouldn't want to see me, come by Yui's house so we can have some fun tonight! I'll see ya there!" Unfolding the rest of the paper, she noticed an extra message.

"P.S. This is Yui, hi Mio-chan! Come to my house so we can have lotsa tea and sweets and fun!  
This is Tsumugi; I hope you won't feel too mad at Ricchan to not visit us at Yui-chan's house for at least a little bit.  
Azusa Nakano: I think you overreacted, senpai. You and I both know how far Ritsu-senpai can go with her jokes. Anyway, you should still come visit us at Yui-senpai's house. I heard Ui's making hotpot; perhaps that can make you feel a bit better. Hope to see you there soon!" And at the bottom of the paper were all three of their signatures.

Despite the zombie apocalypse now converging upon them, Mio couldn't help but smile for one shining moment at this letter. _I'm so glad to have such wonderful friends…_

It was at that moment that she wanted to hit herself in the head with Elizabeth.

"Ritsu! Yui! All of them! They said they were going to Yui's house! They can't be out there with all of the…z-zombies out there!" She struggled to finally fathom the thought that a zombie invasion was actually occurring.

Quickly taking out her phone, she skillfully typed out a message to send to all of them about the impending doom. She then froze.

"They would probably have known by now…" her phone dropped to the ground, staying intact just barely, due to the cover. "They could be fighting off…z-zombies right now! What if something happened to them?"

She ran towards the window and spotted many zombies outside on the streets; more than there were before. _Where did they all come from?_ Her knowledge of science and common sense were now discarded into the trash bin with the rest of her throw up as garbage at this point.

Mio jumped high enough to bump her head on the ceiling when she heard groans coming from outside the double doors that protected her. _So this is how Ritsu feels…_she thought while rubbing her head.

If she wasn't being extra alert, she wouldn't have heard the vibration coming from her phone with all of the loud moaning.

Picking up her phone, her eyes lit up at who texted her. "It's Ritsu!" she yelled in excitement. Opening the message as quickly as she could, she read it.

_If you're in the clubroom, STAY INSIDE THE CLUBROOM. You have plenty of tea and sweets to keep you content. Stay there until we arrive. _

"That's it…?" She scrolled down the phone with the cursor but still found there was nothing else in the message. "That can't be it, that can't be!"

As if God answered that one small prayer of wanting more substance in the message, her phone vibrated yet again. This time, it was from Azusa.

"This is Ritsu; my phone died so I used Azusa's. A few last words of advice before I go: Be ready to fight."

Her fear reaching the peak of Mt. Everest, she truly felt scared for her life for once. This wasn't just a watching-a-scary-movie-and-getting-no-sleep-for-that-night kind of scariness. This was a you're-going-to-die-if-you-make-a-mistake kind of scariness. Mio just wanted to go to her corner, fall asleep, wake up, and realize this was all a big dream. But she knew that thought was not possible anymore. Not when she snapped that young boy's neck at a 180 degree angle.

She grabbed her guitar case and took out Elizabeth. Shaking violently from the situation at hand but trying to stay brave, she raised it in a battle stance, ready for the zombies to burst through.

_

* * *

_

Elsewhere…

"Mio…hold on, we're coming."

"Ricchan, do you think zombies enjoy tea?"

"Ergh…"

**

* * *

**

A/N:

So tell me what you think? I know that there is already another zombie apocalypse K-On! Fanfiction out there already and that it's probably ten times better than this but I couldn't resist writing this sort of scenario myself. Plus, I wanted to post something up for Halloween! Anyway, I hope that you enjoyed this story! And to be honest, that raising the dead incantation sort of thing was just a bunch of B/S since I honestly don't know how to do that sort of ritual, if they even exist. I apologize for any OOC that they showed; please tell me which parts need improvement if you have time because that'll help me and blah blah blah. Again, thanks for reading! 


	2. A Miasmic Revelation

**A/N: **Well, this took a very, VERY long time to come out with. Stupid block. Eh, that's a stupid excuse; I did have a block, but I'm also very lazy. Well, I'm still glad I got this out and even though I believe I did better in the first chapter, I'm somewhat satisfied with how this turned out. Enjoy chapter 2.

* * *

All was quiet in the living room of Yui Hirasawa's house. The place almost seemed dead with the eerie silence that accompanied the air, save the TV. The only occupants inside were the four members of the light music club, minus Mio of course, and Ui. All of them were gathered in the living room, eyes figuratively glued to the television set in front of them. After finishing the letter by writing their signatures, albeit those looking like random scribbles on the whiteboard, they headed toward the Hirasawa household.

News casts were always boring to them but this particular one on the TV could possibly save their lives. It's not like they had a choice anyway; all the other channels were broadcasting the same program. Yui confirmed this when she attempted to watch the Food Channel.

"They didn't even show that special recipe for that triple-layer chocolate cake they promised yesterday…"

"Quiet Yui!" Ritsu hissed. "Wait for the message to repeat itself!" After a good thirty seconds, the message restarted right from the beginning.

When they arrived at Yui's house, the younger sister didn't even bother to give them a warm greeting. Instead, she pushed each of them quickly inside, locked the door, set up a bunch of chairs against the knob, and gathered them all in the living to watching the broadcast on the TV.

"_Please just watch this and it'll explain everything…_" she said only minutes ago. Giving her a look of confusion, they all agreed to just listening to whatever this certain broadcast had to say, especially if it was important enough for Ui to throw away her nice persona.

"I am Yo Aradumats, here to report about the strange phenomena that has been occurring around the whole country of Japan." Everybody's ears perked up when this man spoke. A man who seemed to be in the military due to his uniform seemed to be talking from a location that seemed completely foreign to the girls. However, if it was on every channel, serious shit must be going down. "What I am about to tell you is the only conclusion the scientists have come up with, despite how unreasonable it sounds."

While the military man was talking, Ritsu couldn't help but remember how strange everyone seemed while on their way to the Hirasawa residence. First of all, almost every person they passed by along the way carried the same dead look on their faces. The first few were amusing to the group, as they thought of it as just a very realistic zombie costume. Yui was even playing with one of the people's ears, accidentally pulling it off in the process. Assuming it was just cheap plastic, the girl shrugged it off and placed it back in his hand as if nothing happened. However, the sightings of these deceased-appearing people increased and their feelings of amusement were quickly turning into fear and just being creeped out. It felt as if every person had their eyes focused on solely them.

Each of them was beginning to get scared so they quickened their pace to Yui's house. _Something's up_, Ritsu thought at the time, _but I'm honestly too scared as hell to even wanna find out._ On the way there, she even bumped into one of them and his arm detached from the rest of his body. Her mind was definitely freaked out, but she managed to convince herself it was just another realistic costume. By the time they arrived, they felt the weight of the sky lift off of their shoulders now that they were under the secure roof of a modern day Japanese home.

Without even noticing, the military man already moved on to discuss about whatever it was he mentioned earlier. _Damn it, I wasn't listening._ Ritsu internally face-palmed at how she wasn't listening to something that appeared so important.

"Uh, hey guys, could you tell me what that guy said? I kinda wasn't listening, haha…" Her weak laugh began fading away as she spotted the expressions of horror on each of their faces. "Um, hey guys? Could you tell me what he said…?"

No response.

The drummer was beginning to get nervous but annoyed at how they were completely ignoring her. She took out her drumsticks and clacked them together as loudly as she could.

"HEY!" she yelled. This brought everyone back to their senses, yet it didn't take away that expression…

"Now that I got your attention…" Ritsu said while putting her drumsticks away, "could someone tell me what the hell that guy said that was so important?"

Everyone returned to the phase of looking anywhere but at Ritsu. This only frustrated her more, and caused her to raise her voice even further. "COULD SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME WHAT THE HELL THAT GUY SAID?" Her voice was now ten times as louder as it was a few seconds ago. It echoed throughout every room and back to its source. The only other noise evident in the house was the broadcast that Ritsu was now paying no attention to.

Tsumugi and Azusa flinched at how Ritsu used the word "hell". Although it wasn't a valid cuss word, they never heard their drummer use such language at them. _It's best that we tell her,_ Tsumugi thought. _But my mouth won't even open for me,_ Azusa thought at the same time.

"Ricchan?" Yui beat the two to confessing.

"Thank God that somebody responded, tell me whatsup Yui."

"Um…" the guitarist fidgeted with her fingers as she attempted to tell "whatsup". She looked at her fellow band members and Ui, clearly looking for assistance with this.

Ui had stayed quiet after that quick statement at the door, Azusa's lips stayed closed as if someone threw a super glue grenade at them, and Mugi's eagerness to confess was now low.

"Yui, spit it out already." The drummer gave her an impatient look, making it all the more difficult to tell.

The way both their eyes met was an absolute burning sensation for the guitarist. Her best friend's amber eyes were blazing with impatience that was ready to turn into rage. Yui's innocent brown, chocolate eyes were quivering before her.

"Well, Ricchan, you see…" She couldn't bring herself to do it. Unfortunately, this allowed Ritsu's impatience to get the best of her. She grabbed Yui by the collar and held her up against the living room wall with a loud thud. Where everybody's heads were once staring at random locations, they all were horrified at how angered Ritsu had gotten.

"TELL ME ALREADY, DAMN IT!"

The occupants in the room snapped out of their trance at this action.

"R-ri…ch-chan," Yui was having difficulties even speaking Ritsu's own name with the sort of grip she had on her.

As this scene was taking place, none of them noticed how the program just finished. The message was now repeating itself right from the beginning.

"I am Yo Aradumats, here to report about the strange phenomena that has been occurring around the whole country of Japan…"

Ritsu let go of her death grip on Yui to focus on what the reporter had to say. While Azusa and Ui went to go make sure she was okay, Mugi couldn't help but worry about what she was about to discover.

"The only conclusion that seems plausible, even with the logic we have created as scientists, is this…"

"…" Ritsu's eyes widened. Her jaw dropped straight down onto the floor.

…_What…?_

The other members didn't hold back their emotions anymore. All four girls quickly gathered into a group huddle and began to cry their hearts out.

_No…_

Ritsu's own heart began to beat ever so faster.

_H-he can't be serious…_

The rate only increased.

_This has to be some prank or something…!_

It suddenly stopped for a moment.

Everything began to blur in her eyes as the world slowly disappeared around her. Her ears stayed intact for a few seconds before rejoining the rest of her body into unconsciousness. She could make out each of members' cries of her name. After that, everything went blank.

* * *

"Oh no…you don't think that…"

"I don't think, I know."

"She could not have just done this…"

"Oh, she definitely did. Take a look out there Suki-chan."

"Zombies as far as the eye can see…"

"Exactly. And there's only one person we know who had the book with the incantation last night."

"Good point…one question though…"

"What is it?"

"Uh…why did you let her have the book in the first place?"

"…"

"I mean, she just joined us not too long ago…and you haven't even let me see the book…"

"…"

"Um, so why did you give it her again?"

"…"

"Kyo-chan…?"

"…Because shut up."

"…"

_

* * *

_

Ergh…what the hell happened…

Ritsu had finally awoken from her fainting after a seemingly long five minutes. To her, it felt like an hour passed by.

Her mind was still experiencing the short amnesia it gets when you wake up. _Ugh, I can't even get my own body to move!_ It was true; despite her being awake, she didn't have any energy to move her arms, legs, mouth, or eyes. She could only stay in that state where only her thoughts were intact. Frustrated, she tried moving her arm to hit whatever she was lying down on in anger. Even more frustrated since she couldn't move, she mentally imagined herself hitting the surface in anger, which honestly didn't make her feel any better.

_Okay, since I can't move anything for shit, let's see how I got like this…_Mio had once told her that if she forgot about something, which was very often, she should try to remember the things that happened before it and link to that event she couldn't remember.

_I remember…um…nothing. Yes, I remember nothing, dang it. _Unfortunately, Ritsu couldn't even recall any events before the event she was trying to recall.

_Goddamnit!_

"Ricchan?"

_Did I just say that out loud…?_ Ritsu's mouth finally responded and yelled out her current thoughts. _Of all the things I could shout in this state, it HAD to be that?_

"Ricchan, are you okay?" Her temporary amnesia began to fade away as she recognized the voice who called out to her.

Willing her mouth to move, she called back to her. "Mugi?"

"Ricchan, you're okay!" _Yep, definitely Mugi's voice. _With her lips functioning, she now tried to open her eyes to see the familiar blonde hair that accompanied her voice. It was a big white blur at first, but slowly, they adjusted to the light and eventually made out the strands of blonde.

"You had us worried, Ricchan..." Now fully awake, Ritsu noticed the odd expression present on the keyboardist's face. It showed obvious grief at how her friend was now awake, but the horrified expression from earlier was still evident.

"Mugi, what's wrong?" At that moment, everything that happened before she fainted flashed through her mind in a split second, almost giving her a headache. She clutched her forehead at the sudden pain that erupted in her mind from the split second flashbacks.

"Are you okay?" Mugi cried out, clearly worried. Ritsu settled down after a few seconds, though her expression was similar to Mugi's earlier one.

"Yeah…I'm just fine…" The brunette flashed her trademark grin towards the blonde, but anyone would be able to notice how much she was struggling to keep a smile on her face.

"Ricchan…you don't need to hide it…" Her grin instantly disappeared. "I wish I could say that this is a dream…but it's not…" Tears began to form around the corners of Mugi's eyes. "What you heard on the broadcast...is 100% true…"

As much as she tried to discard that memory away, it just refused to leave.

"Yui-chan and Azusa-chan even looked outside…they saw…_them_ eating her neighbors…"

She just had to accept it.

"It's a zombie outbreak…" Ritsu muttered softly. Mugi nodded with more tears flowing down her cheeks.

Obviously, Ritsu's head was filled to the top of her headband with questions: who, what, where, why, how, and all of that other crap. But it didn't seem like asking them would help, since they just realized this too. Instead, she asked something else that was racking the back of head.

"Everyone's safe though, right?"

Wiping away the liquid on her face with a tissue, Mugi nodded with a small smile. _Good…at least no one's…dead, yet._

"They're just upstairs, looking at the destruction from Yui-chan's window." Ritsu flinched at the word destruction, thinking about how much chaos the zombies could have caused. "Y-you can see the school from up there, hehe." Mugi said, trying to change to a lighter subject. However, this only sent a revelation to Ritsu's head.

"Mio!" The brunette stood up, with her drumsticks gripped firmly in her hands as if they were weapons. Heading towards the door, her once calm amber eyes were now teeming with the same anger as earlier. "Mio's still at the school!"

It seemed as if Mugi realized this earlier because she held no surprised expression on her face. Instead, she only seemed more depressed than ever before.

"We know Ricchan…" Mugi's bangs covered up her blue eyes in saddened fashion.

"What are we doing here then? We need to get to the school and save her!" Looking up from the ground, she saw the brunette head towards the front door, shoving away the load of household furniture Ui took no time in setting up shortly after their arrival.

"Ricchan, come back! We have to stay here! Just calm down!"

"What…?" Turning her back to face the blonde directly, she walked towards her, her face having the appearance of wanting to murder anyone who dare defy her. "How…the…FUCK, do you expect me to calm down?"

Mugi was obviously scared out of her wits when Ritsu cussed at her. Only her. However, Ritsu pressed on.

"My own fucking best friend is out there with a bunch of fucking zombies and you expect me to feel all calm? She's the biggest scaredy-cat in this whole damn world! Just mentioning zombies to her would make her jump out of her seat, but actual zombies invading the earth? How do you think she's doing right now, huh?" Her skin was now full of creases at the amount of anger she just exerted on her poor friend Tsumugi. The latter's eyes were ready to burst from the amount of guilt and sadness with rivers of tears.

"Ricchan!" Looking to her right, she saw Yui, Ui, and Azusa staring at the head banded-brunette in horror.

"Ritsu-senpai, listen to Mugi-senpai! Just calm down!"

"Don't tell me what to do Nakano!" Azusa flinched at how Ritsu referred to her by her surname, revealing the amount of outrage the drummer had. "How would you feel if Yui was out there all alone with a bunch of undead guys who want to tear you apart limb from limb with their own fucking mouths?" Azusa cringed at the thought of an innocent person such as Yui being devoured by those undead demons from hell.

"RITSU-SAN!" Everybody's eyes looked at Ui now, surprised at how much she raised her voice. "I may not know Mio-san as well as Onee-chan or you do, but she's our friend too!"

"Mmhm," Yui said, agreeing with her younger sister. "Mio-chan's also our friend! We care about her too!"

"And you shouldn't be taking out your anger on Mugi-senpai!" she stated, recovering from the image of Yui being eaten by zombies. "Look at her!" Azusa pointed toward the quivering figure in front of her.

The outbursts from her friends had calmed her down but seeing her own friend Mugi, her face abundant with droplets of water, like that, and knowing that she caused it…it made Ritsu's anger immediately dissipate.

"Mugi…I'm sorry…" Ritsu's mind was almost ready to break down. Too much had already happened today. Her heart was going through too many emotional mood changes. First she found out about the zombie apocalypse, which was enough to make her faint. Then, she learned about the almost inevitable fate of her own best friend dying. Now, she herself caused one of the gentlest creatures on Earth to break down on the floor crying, all because she couldn't control herself. Ritsu flashbacked to earlier, remembering how she couldn't control herself with Mio either. She went too far with Mio's feelings; now she went too far with Mugi's. _What the hell is wrong with me today…_she thought, her face filled with guilt. _I need to get my act together…Mio could have been with us if I hadn't pushed her too far…I don't want to lose Mugi to this crazy apocalypse either…_

"It's okay…" Ritsu's head instantly flared up at the sound of Mugi's voice. "It's a lot for you to take, Ricchan…" She was barely able to talk between the constant sniffling. "I'm sorry…" Ritsu could barely take the sight of those normally friendly and gentle ocean blue eyes crying.

"Mugi-chan, you shouldn't apologize." Yui was beginning to have another wisdom moment. "And Ricchan…"

"Yeah, I know. I'm sorry Mugi."

"No no no, Ricchan! Wrong!"

"What?" She looked at Yui quizzically.

"This is a lot for you to take, especially so suddenly like this. It's a lot for all of us to take, right?" She looked around at everyone, with all of them nodding sadly. "You shouldn't be so hard on yourself, okay?"

"Yui-senpai's right," Azusa joined. "Besides, we need to focus on saving Mio-senpai; not being sad about the current situation, right?"

"…Right," Mugi and Ritsu said together. At this, the two dispelled any of the earlier tension and calmed down.

* * *

"Now…" Azusa, despite being the junior in the club, began to take charge. "We need to get to Mio-senpai. She's at the school, and there's no doubt going to be a bunch of…z-zombies," It seems like she was still extremely frightened. "So we need to be on our guard at all times!" Yet she managed to keep her cool and stay confident. "Of course, we're going to need to defend ourselves against them somehow…"

"Oh!" Ui raised her hand as if she was in her classroom.

"Uh…Ui?"

"We have a lot of pots and pans we can use as weapons," she said.

"Perfect, you go get them for us." Saluting her friend as if Azusa was her commanding officer, she marched off to the kitchen to gather their equipment.

"Heh, I'm surprised," Ritsu stated while watching Ui advance towards the kitchen. "Whenever I played _Left 4 Dead_, I'd imagine you guys as the ones who would freak out and I'd be the one who stayed calm." Everyone smiled at how Ritsu seemed much calmer now. "And then Mio would be the one fainting…" Calmness destroyed. Ritsu's voice faded as the mention of Mio's name brought her to that earlier revelation.

Frantically wanting to change the subject, the two guitarists looked around for something to talk about. Okay, they really didn't know what to talk about and that's the advice they got from Sawako whenever they ran out of things to say.

"_Just look around the room and find something interesting to talk about! That's why boys were so attracted to me; cause I never ran out of things to say!"_ To Azusa, remembering this caused her to sigh and sweat drop at her sensei on numerous occasions. To Yui, however, this was one of the best pieces of advice she'd ever receive from anyone ever. That's why the airhead seemed so random. Even when she was involved in a conversation, she would randomly look around the room and talk about whatever she saw.

The twin-tailed guitarist's eyes finally landed on a familiar picture: the Christmas picture they took on the hillside, the sunrise clearly visible in the background.

"Ritsu-senpai, do you remember last year's Christmas?" Caught off guard at the random topic, she gave her a look of confusion. "We played at the Live House, remember?"

"Oh yeah, why?" Her question was almost drowned out by the sounds of clattering coming from the kitchen. Ui must have been digging deep inside the cupboards for the "special" pans.

"Wasn't it fun?" Azusa asked, becoming enwrapped in the memory.

"Yes, it was a very fun time," Mugi said, still sad about what happened earlier.

"Oh yeah, it was!" Yui said, now involved in the conversation. "Hehe, Azu-nyan was wearing those tiger ears the whole time; so cute!~" She grabbed onto her kouhai as usual.

"Yeah...it was a fun time…" She reminisced at the performance; how their rehearsal sucked at the first few attempts but then how the other performers encouraged them. Azusa could almost hear the roar of the crowd now. She could hear the _"Fuwa Fuwa Time"_ sung by Yui, and then repeated by Mio. _I wonder if we'll be able to have a fun Christmas this year…_she thought.

"Okay, here you go!" Ui's voice snapped Azusa out of her Christmas-related thoughts and back at the current situation at hand. _What was I thinking?_ The girl thought as she received a big frying pan from Ui. _I need to focus on saving Mio-senpai! Now, what's the fastest path to Sakuragaoka?_

While Azusa was busy trying to formulate possible routes to the bassist, Ritsu sent a text to her best friend, assuring her that they were completely fine, indirectly, of course.

_If you're in the clubroom, STAY INSIDE THE CLUBROOM. You have plenty of tea and sweets to keep you content. Stay there until we arrive. _

"Yeah, that should be enough," the drummer said to herself. "Oh, wait, I forgot something." As if fate didn't feel like cooperating with her, her phone shut off due to the lack of battery power. "Ugh, damn it. Azusa, let me borrow your phone for a sec."

_This is Ritsu; my phone died so I used Azusa's. A few last words of advice before I go: Be ready to fight._

"Hm…maybe I should be a little less serious…" At that moment, Azusa announced that they would be leaving the house soon. She put away the junior's phone in her own pocket, ready to hear what the little student had to say.

They would be leaving the safety of the Hirasawa household, and venturing out into the dangerous, zombie-infested world right outside their doorstep.

_I can do this, we can do this…we're going to make it, we're going to save Mio-senpai…_Azusa repeated similar phrases in her mind to keep herself confident.

_Just wait Mio…we're on our way…_Ritsu thought.

Just as Yui was putting her jacket on, she looked at her younger sister. The ponytailed brunette had a smile on her face, as if this was a completely normal situation. She definitely knew something was up with Ui. She even noticed the slight crinkle at the end of her smile.

"Ui?" she called out.

"What is it, Onee-chan?" Ui asked.

"Um…is there-"

"Alright, who's ready to bust some brains?" Ritsu waved her frying pan in the air, trying ever so hard to motivate everyone. Luckily it worked; Mugi seemed to finally get over herself and waved her own weapon in the air, with Yui and even Ui joining as well. Complying with the rest of the group, Azusa raised hers high in the air, despite her being the shortest one there. _Nice to see the old Ritsu-senpai back…_

* * *

"I don't exactly think that's a good reason…"

"Just shut up."

"…"

"…"

"…so what are we going to do now?"

"Simple; that book had the incantation to raise them from the dead. It should have one to put them back in their hole where they belong."

"Um…there's one problem with that…"

"What?"

"How are we going to get past all of those zombies?"

"Again, it's simple; grab the nearest broom, recruit a few other survivors, and fight our way there."

"Easier said than done…"

"Which will make this all the more fun."

* * *

**A/N: **Oh my gosh, original characters…? This story is so going to suck now! …Well, it might be a risk since most people tend to make original characters bland and uninteresting, especially when they're important to the plot, but I'm still going to try it. I apologize if Ritsu's cussing was overdoing it too, but hell, it IS a zombie apocalypse after all. A lot of people would do things they wouldn't do normally, cussing probably being one of them. Also, I'm not completely in the dark anymore and I actually have an idea of where I want this story to go. Yay. Well, review the story if you wish to do so; constructive criticism is very much appreciated.


	3. Let the Blood Start Spillin'

**A/N**: So um…I bet the people who have been following this story are probably really upset with me on how dang slow I am at updating huh…? Yeah, that's definitely something that I need to improve on…Three months and I only got three chapters up. I so fail as a writer in terms of chapter updating. Oh well, enjoy the new chapter!

* * *

_Where are they… _Mio's mind couldn't help but think this with every single second passing by. Every time the tick tock of the clock resounded throughout the clubroom, she would have to endure the thought of being trapped. The clock seemed to mock her when both hands stood completely still one moment, then skipped ahead a few minutes. However, whether it had been twenty-four hours, forty-five minutes, or thirty-three seconds, she lost track of time ever since Ritsu sent her those text messages. The concept of time became irrelevant to her situation, because it honestly seemed endless to her.

The hand started moving again. Another second passed by.

The constant clicking echoed throughout her skull in an endless loop.

To be honest, only twelve minutes have elapsed since receiving Ritsu's messages. The first two minutes she spent gripping her bass guitar. Trembling, yes, but somewhat ready to fight against the horde that would rush through the double doors at any minute. However, no such moment arrived. Luckily, these particular zombies outside weren't well coordinated with their arms. They could bite through the muscles of a human being with ease, but the concept of a locked door seemed to prove a challenge for them.

After standing in the same stationary position for those two minutes, the expression on her face slowly transitioned from forced bravery to absolute terror. Her legs gave out on the spot and her body drooped down to the floor similar to how spaghetti does on a plate. The Fender Jazz Bass fell with a loud thud, which only enraged the horde outside and cause them to try to break down the door faster. Without correct arm coordination though, it might take a while. Plus, the piled stacks of boxes from the supply closet would help as well.

On the floor, Mio decided it was best that she assured herself that they wouldn't push through the door. So, the bassist decided to push more boxes of random leftovers from the Light Music Club against the double doors to completely ensure her safety. _That should hold them off for a while, _she thought.

The next ten minutes were spent thinking about the current situation. All of her emotions were coming out at once, like the local fireworks display at the Summer Festival. Her mind was buzzing with extreme mental activity as many thoughts came up in her head.

_Why did this have to happen to me? _Questioning.

_If I hadn't yelled at Ritsu, we would all be together!_ Regret.

_Are they still…a-ali…a-aliv…okay? _Worry.

The fact of the matter was that these thoughts weren't occurring in her brain one at a time. It was all at once.

The next two minutes were spent banging her head on the wall of the clubroom in frustration, sadness, and many other emotions up to the point where a huge bump disproportional to the rest of her body would appear, as if this was one of those anime she occasionally watched with Ritsu. _Where are they…where are they...where are they…_Mio decided to settle on that for now. The broken record-esque thought began to fade away though as she felt a headache approaching.

As her forehead began to hurt, she sat with her back against the wall and let her legs hang out in whatever position they desired.

Her eyes wandered across the clubroom filled with an overwhelming number of mementos that triggered the happier times of her life in the light music club. Numerous pictures of previous light-music-club-related events were pasted onto the whiteboard. Mio observed how joyful she was in those pictures, particularly the picture of their training camp in their second year, at Mugi's "small" summer house. Each of the members of the club was lined up together at the beach.

Yui wrapped one arm tightly around her Azu-nyan at one side, with the latter resisting. Ritsu imitated the same action with Mio on the other side, which caught the girl off guard. Mugi stood in the middle, eyes glittering with glee for obvious reasons. Staring at Ritsu drape her arm around her in the picture, she couldn't help but think the same thought her past self had.

_Idiot._

Smiling at her comment, she noticed the absolute euphoria her eyes contained, even if her body wanted to smack Ritsu upside the head at the time. Her grey eyes spoke loud and clearly how happy the girl was. Grey would usually be interpreted as an empty color, being monotone and all. However, in the picture, even that color was sparking with life and mirth. Now, however, empty would be the perfect word to describe how her eyes looked. In fact, her whole body looked empty, drained of any positive feelings she felt earlier.

Of course, the reason for feeling this way was completely understandable. After all, she was trapped in her own school in the late evening with a zombie army growing by the minute right outside the clubroom doors.

Being Mio, she saw that as too grotesque of an image, so she imagined it like the standard basis of most fairy tales she heard her mom read to her as a child.

The princess would be trapped in the castle, the brave knight/prince would come save her, and the two would fall in love and live happily ever after. That's sums up most of her childhood stories that were read to the little girl.

Mio thought of herself as the trapped princess in this case, and the brave person who would come save her was actually a group of five people, although she was focusing mostly on Ritsu because of her regret from cussing at her earlier.

Mio blushed when she thought about the ending of those fairy tales though; Ritsu and her were best friends, sure, but falling in love with the brunette? _As if that would happen! _A blush still appeared on her face regardless. Anyway, the point was that she was stuck in the clubroom, awaiting her rescue crew to come save her.

Looking at her phone for the time, she noticed it had been fifteen minutes since Ritsu had sent her those last two texts.

_If you're in the clubroom, STAY INSIDE THE CLUBROOM. You have plenty of tea and sweets to keep you content. Stay there until we arrive. _

Mio felt conflicted at this particular message. Although the clubroom was basically a safe haven for her, with enough tea and snacks to last her a good week or so, waiting in here was complete agony. Never did she imagine such a horrible experience could be had in this room, the same room filled with so many good times that surpassed Yui's ability to count, at least in English. And she definitely never expected herself to be stuck in this kind of situation, what with the zombie apocalypse.

Nonetheless, she couldn't stand to just sit and wait here anymore. Her own best friends were out there in the thick of battle with merciless creatures that shouldn't even exist, all trying to rescue her.

_I can't just sit here and let them…d-d-d-die out there…_That thought was obviously not a pleasant one, even more so obvious from her mental stuttering. _I have to go out there and help them!_

_B-b-b-b-but…all of the…you can't, you can't!_ Mio's breath hitched for a moment. An opposing side of herself, the rational side, spoke up.

_But they're my friends!_ She argued back, aghast at how her other side even thought about leaving her friends out there. _I have to save them!_

_H-h-h-how do you expect to g-g-get through all of them…? You w-w-won't make it!_

Mio realized how annoying her stuttering was when she was scared. Sure, cute at first but it would start to bug people after a while, including her.

_Even so, I have to try!_ Her confidence was beginning to rise up. _I can't just leave them out there with all of those zombies! _If she had the time, she would celebrate being able to say the word "zombie" without any stuttering. _I'm going!_

The girl stood up from her spot, legs not feeling so jelly-like anymore.

_Didn't you hear what Ritsu said, you idiot?_ Mio stopped dead in her tracks. The tone from the earlier nervous Mio was completely gone; a new, darker and more serious one replacing it. Mio stayed silent for a while, trying to come up with a response to herself.

Actually, this whole conversation was awkward, considering how she was arguing with her own self. Nevertheless, she let the other side of her continue since no response came to her.

_She said to stay in the clubroom. What happens if you can't find her? She'll experience what we went through! She'll open the doors, expecting to see us! But we won't be in here if we're out there!_

It was a valid point that was hard to argue against. She was right though. If somehow, the group of five happened to pass by Mio on the way to the school, they would each be in a precarious zombie-filled situation.

Mio thought hard about this decision she was about to make; however, doing so would definitely be easier if her mind wasn't boggled with the vast amount of emotions she was currently experiencing. As much as she wished she could huddle up in that same corner in the room, fall asleep, and have this situation completely disappear, she knew such a thing wouldn't happen. The girl had to choose between sacrificing her own life to save her friends, at the risk of her friends not being able to find her in the first place.

Groans of monsters that definitely needed some lotion interrupted her thoughts, reminding her of the limited time she had.

The girl lifted her head up toward the double doors.

No longer would she hide from these creatures.

No longer would she be that helpless princess in the castle either.

_I'm sorry but my friends could be in trouble right now. I have to go out there! Everybody's waiting for me._

Mio made her decision.

She stood up from her spot and grabbed her bass guitar forcefully. She was in the exact same position seventeen minutes ago, only now, her face wasn't filled with her trademark scaredy-cat expression. Mio looked absolutely ready to kick some serious zombie ass.

_A few last words of advice before I go: Be ready to fight._ Ritsu's final text message echoed in her mind.

_For your sake Ritsu, for the light music club's sake, for all of my friends' sake…I am ready to fight._

However, there was a little hurdle she had to overcome before she could assist her friends in the battle between humans and zombies that would probably be discussed for centuries if they survived. _So…ugh, how should I plan to get out of here?_

If this was an anime, multiple sweatdrops would be present on Mio.

* * *

In the dim-lit clubroom for the Occult Club, two girls stood still in the middle with their expressions covered by their bangs. The only source of light was the light bulb hanging from a thin string, casting shadows across the features of both girls' faces.

Suki's brown hair was absolutely unruly due to the difficulties they faced just to make it to the clubroom. It ran all the way down her back, right above her bottom. Her face bore a few scars from the zombies, including one that scratched right across her forehead. The headband she would normally wear was discarded, allowing her bangs to cover the embarrassing mark.

Kyo's hair wasn't completely black but an extremely dark shade of navy blue, almost fading into the background of the room due to the horrible lighting. It was equally as messed up as Suki's, several strands protruding everywhere. It was considerably shorter, hanging right above her shoulders.

As Suki's amber eyes stared at the girl in front of her, she couldn't help but feel horrified.

"You can't possibly force me to go back out there!" she yelled.

"Suki-chan," Kyo's tone of voice turned calm despite her friend's woeful one. "Will you kindly shut up and look at the facts? Standing around here won't help us out at all. We need to find that book to stop this madness, and I'll need all the help I can get." Kyo's concern was almost always covered by a few tinges of rudeness, just because that's how she was.

Silence filled the room for a fair amount of time with Suki still trying to decide. _I know we have to go out there eventually but…facing them earlier was already traumatic enough! _She quickly recalled what had only happened a few minutes ago, where four zombies charged at the pair. Luckily, Kyo was more of a fighter than she was, disarming (literally) one of the zombies and beating the second one with said arm. This leads one to wonder why she would be in a club such as the Occult Club.

"_Meh, just wanted to try something new for once."_ She once said to Suki at the beginning of the year. This was both Suki and Kyo's final year in high school, with both friends planning to attend the same college. Kyo wanted to try out new things since they would soon be filled to the brim with homework in the near future, so she joined a bunch of different clubs. Eventually, she settled with the Occult Club since the supernatural forces interested her most out of the ones she joined. Suki followed her along so she wouldn't feel so lonely.

"So, what's your decision?" The raven-haired girl's voice snapped her from her flashback.

"I'll go with you," she finally agreed. "But…where are going to find that book?"

"My first guess is that we should check out the nearest graveyard since that's where the incantation would need to be performed."

"But that's assuming that she's still there! What if she isn't? What if she's leading this zombie army?"

"Don't worry your goddamn head so much, zombies don't work like that. They don't really follow any leader or anything; they just live and bite other people. So when she raised them from the dead, they probably just got her. I have no idea why that girl would think she could become the leader of the zombies, or why she would want to be. Exact revenge? World domination? Hell if I know, but we need to stop these guys."

The brunette nodded at this, despite half of her being scared to near paralysis at having to face a whole army of zombies.

"Look, it's not like it's just us…" Kyo said nicely for once in her life after noticing the obvious hints of worry on her best friend's face. "There's bound to be other survivors out there just like us, who want this to end. We'll take anyone we can at this point."

_At least we're not completely alone_, Suki thought. "Thanks for that, Kyo-chan." At this, a small smile crept its way onto her face.

"Hey, it's only because we're in such a crisis like this that I'm being nice. If I spent all day cussing your ass out, we probably wouldn't get past the front of the school." At this, Suki's smile faltered.

Kyo sighed. "…Well, we are best friends too, so ya know…I gotta comfort you too." Suki's smile was instantly restored.

It proved to be contagious as one began to appear on Kyo's face. Despite her expression, she couldn't help but feel worried as well. _To be honest, I'm definitely scared as hell. But I gotta stay strong for Suki-chan, or else, she'll break down and we'll be a zombie's next meal. _

"So…are you ready?" Suki asked.

"Hold up, let's see what we can find in the supply closet as weapons."

The girls were able to find a few brooms, knives for cutting open whatever Occult members cut open, and a metal pole. Where was this metal pole from? Hell if they know, and hell if I knew, but it would do some good damage to a zombie's head.

"Okay, on three, I'll unlock the door and we charge out…" Kyo stated. "You sure you're ready?"

Suki nodded, yet her best friend could still detect the slightest hint of worry again. _Even the smallest ounce of fear I noticed on you worries me so much… Ugh, okay…just stay strong Kyo._

"One…"

_I just gotta keep my cool…_

"Two…"

_We're gonna survive…_

"And..."

_We kindly show these zombie bitches back to their grave!_

* * *

"THREE!" The door was flung back, revealing the dark atmosphere of Zombie land. The girl who opened said door, Ritsu, felt fear worm into her as she saw those zombies from earlier. _Oh God, I'm scared,_ was her first thought as soon as she saw the first zombie.

Seeing said creature charge at her with its mouth wide open was enough to snap her out of her stunned state. "Ergh, take this ya undead freak!" She swung her frying pan in the direction of its mouth, earning a loud bang that resounded in each of the girls' ears.

The zombie's head was completely disfigured, and lay down on the porch in front of the brunette. "Heh, how do you like that?" she yelled in victory at achieving her first blood.

Looking at the drummer, everybody's fear slowly began to dissipate as confidence soon welled up inside them. If Ritsu was able to overcome the fact that they were killing the once innocent residents of this area, they should be able to as well.

However, the girls still tried to avoid smacking zombies unless they were forced to. Ritsu, on the other hand, was going on a killing spree, smashing any unfortunate zombie that happened to be in her path. Quickly turning into a running riot, Ritsu ended up getting ahead of the group.

"Ritsu-senpai, don't get too far away from us!" Azusa shouted toward the senior.

"Don't worry Azusa, it's all under control!"

"Ritsu-senpai, watch out!" Azusa's warning was too late as a zombie lunged at Ritsu from the sky, catching the brunette completely off guard. Holding her down with one arm, it sent its mouth at the girl's other arm to snag a bite out of her. She struggled against it, vigorously pushing her open arm against its mouth to subdue it.

"Somebody help me out here!" she yelled out. Azusa was about to head over to her when three more zombies charged at her. She raised her pan in a fighting stance, ready to take each of them on when she noticed three people appear in front of her.

"Azu-nyan, you go help Ricchan!" Yui stated firmly.

"Let us take care of these for you!" Mugi said.

Ui, albeit having a worried expression on her face, nodded violently at her best friend as well. Mouthing the words "thank you", Azusa ran straight past the zombies, confusing them for a quick moment. This moment proved to be their downfall when they received three frying pans to their jaw bones. The sound of these bones breaking echoed in the junior's ears like a firecracker.

"Ritsu-senpai!" Azusa called out as she quickly pounded the lunging zombie away by hitting it in the right in the face, bones instantly cracking and blood instantly spewing onto the street pavement and their uniforms. "Are you okay?" She checked Ritsu's body for any scratches or wounds.

"Tch, of course I am!" The girl instantly stood up, a big grin on her face. "I'm not gonna die this early in the apocalypse!" Seeing that smile instantly reassured the smaller guitarist that she wasn't bruised badly or anything.

"Oh, senpai, your headband..." She pointed toward the bangs now flowing freely down from Ritsu's forehead.

"Dang it; it must have fallen down the sewage drain when that zombie pounced on me," she stated, eyes staring at the water drainage system.

Soon enough, the other three girls regrouped with each other after killing their share of the miniature zombie horde. They managed to get past their first wave of the horde with only a few minor scratches and bruises that could be easily shrugged off. For a group of girls whose world seemed to be all happy and worry-free, they handled this situation pretty well.

"I'm starting to get scared though…that zombie that attacked you seemed different from the others…" their kouhai stated.

"Yeah, you're right about that Azusa," Ritsu agreed. "This one was way faster; got me on my back in less than a second. I guess this means that not all of them are mindless bodies that have no strategy at all."

The now-headband-less girl began to think for a second when a realization hit her. "That zombie was just like the one from _Left 4 Dead_! It was just like the Hunter zombie!"

"Hunter zombie?" Mugi thought aloud. "Well, if the zombies we're dealing with are similar to the ones in that video game…that must mean there are more types as well!" The gentle Ojou-sama looked distressed and scarred for life. _It's hard enough that we have to deal with hundreds of these regular zombies…but there could also be more dangerous types as well?_ The thought of the various kinds of menacing abilities they could have begun to reduce not only Mugi's but everyone's hope of making it out alive.

Yui tried to keep her usual smile on her face but it was beginning to crumble. Some of the monsters she just killed weren't actual zombies in the true definition but neighbors that were infected by them. Yui, being one of the most kind and caring people in the world, just had to slam a metal pan into innocent little kids that lived on her same street. _They didn't deserve to die like this!_ She thought as she looked upon their dead bodies.

Ui wasn't fairing any better either, the realization of different zombie types had also worried her, making this situation all the more grim.

"Guys, come on…" Ritsu tried to get their attention but it was no use; their hope was beginning to lower.

"Ugh…EVERYBODY LISTEN UP!" Everybody perked up at this outburst. "Look, with this kind of attitude we're showing, there's no possible way we'll be able to make it out of this alive! There's no way we'll be able to save Mio!" At the mention of Mio's name, the emptiness in their eyes disappeared.

Ritsu calmed down by taking a good long inhale and exhale, not wanting to flip out like she did before. "My point is, if we spend every interlude between our fights sulking like this, we'll never make it to the school. We have to stay hopeful and positive if we can ever think of saving Mio!"

"But Ritsu-san…" Everybody's heads turned to Ui, who hasn't talked since they were back at her house. "After we find Mio-san, _then _what are we going to do?"

"We'll get off of this island, that's for sure!"

"We barely made it through this one fight; how are we supposed to be able to push through ten more of these alive?"

"…well," the sound of a zombie cry interrupted their conversation. "We'll just have to try our best!" Raising her frying pan in the air, she began to move in the direction of the school once more.

Reluctantly, everybody else followed her.

"Ui, don't talk like that…you're making me feel sad," Yui said to her little sister.

"Oh, I'm sorry Onee-chan!" Ui apologized.

"Just, try to stay positive okay? I know it's hard to in this kind of situation but, can you just try to at least…? For me?"

_It's hard to…if only you knew…what happened… _"I-I'll try to…" she said with a small smile.

"Good…I guess we can't hold back now though…Ui, hold my pan for me." Once Ui got a hold of Yui's frying pan, the guitarist kneeled onto the ground and took the guitar case off of her back. Unzipping the case, she whispered closely to her guitar. "Gitah, I'm sorry…but for us to survive, I'm going to have to use you as a weapon…" She then raised her Les Paul, ready for any more fights to come their way.

_If Onee-chan is starting to get serious about this, then I will have to too!_ Ui thought.

There was a loud deafening roar that pierced through all five of the girls' ears, startling them to near fainting. The source of the sound was a good distance away, but its growl was so loud that it echoed all the way to them.

"That sounded just like…" Ritsu began, but she couldn't finish her sentence.

"What Ricchan? It sounded like what?" Yui asked, getting worried at the horrified expression on her friend's face, yet trying to maintain a brave expression for her younger sister.

"It…it sounded like…" she took a deep breath. "Guys, we have to keep moving toward the school and save Mio. Then from there, we'll try to find a way to get out of this zombie infested place. Let the government take care of this. Got it?"

Everybody nodded in agreement.

"Ritsu-san." All of their heads turned toward Ui. "I think…you should tell us more about the zombie types you encountered in…_Left 4 Dead_."

"…Yeah…it's probably for the best that I do. Can't promise that the zombies we'll fight'll be exactly the same but, hey, I guess it can't hurt to tell you."

After a good few minutes of cautionary walking, Ritsu spoke up again.

"One more thing guys." The golden-haired girl's eyes stared at each of the girls straight. "Promise me that you won't hold back, please? If you do, then we won't ever be able to make it out of this alive. Give it your absolute all! Even if we do die, let's die with a bang!" As soon as her fist was raised in the air, the group morale was once again restored.

_Ritsu-senpai…_Azusa thought. _She's becoming such a good leader…keeping her cool in this kind of situation…_At this act, she began to feel more respect toward her senpai. _If it wasn't for her, we'd all still be sad about this at Ui's house..._

"Ricchan, there's a group of zombies heading toward us!" Mugi exclaimed, pointing her finger at the small horde.

Before she had a chance to respond, Yui spoke up. "Well then Mugi-chan, I guess that means we got to hurry and save Mio-chan, right?" With that statement, Yui sprinted toward the group with Gitah held tight in her grip, followed by the other girls.

Tsumugi nodded and joined their attack. _I guess there's no other choice but to fight them!_ _We have to if we want to save Mio-chan!_

All earlier feelings of not wanting to attack the once-innocent neighbors were gone. This was a battlefield where the rules were to either kill, or be killed.

With that, the sound of cracked skulls and bone detachments never sounded sweeter to the blonde.

* * *

**A/N**: Major thanks to my now official beta, majestic mucus! Your tips definitely helped make this chapter better, so thanks a lot! Anyway, the next chapter is definitely going to be where more zombie-filled action starts to take place. I am excited but also nervous for this part, as it will be my first attempt at doing an action sequence. Hopefully, all will go well in the more action-y parts of the story, and I'll stop being such a lazy bum and update faster.


	4. Close Encounters with the Dead

**A/N**: I hope that this chapter isn't too long for you to read. Then again, some people are able to come up with chapters over 10,000 words…meh, enjoy anyway.

* * *

With the sun halfway covered by the shadowy horizon, poor Mio was being pressed for time on thinking of an escape plan. That big ball of extraterrestrial flame was her only source of light since the power was out, and fighting zombies in the dark was definitely not something Mio desired to do that night. At the very least, she wanted to get out of the clubroom so she could just run away from everything if push came to shove. Being stuck inside made her feel like Ton-chan, swimming (or in her case, walking) about the very limited space given to her. Unlike the soft-shelled turtle, however, she was able to escape her prison. The only thing stopping her was those foolish zombies who couldn't turn a doorknob, but could bite through six inches of pure flesh and bone without difficulty.

_There has to be some other door I can use to get out of here or something!_ she thought, while wandering about the clubroom aimlessly. It was futile though; the most effective way of getting out of the clubroom were those double doors she passed by daily.

_I guess…there's no other choice…_she stared straight at those wooden boards of entrance (for zombies) and exit (for Mio's) granting. _There's no avoiding it. If I want to get out of here, I'm going to need to exit through there and just run for it…_

Despite the near mental breakdown, and then recovery, that she went through earlier, she still couldn't help but shudder at the thought of those zombies' lifeless eyes staring at her again, demanding her body's limbs with no please or thank you.

_I've got to stay strong though! If I keep acting scared like this, it'll already be nighttime and…ugh, I wouldn't want to even think of how to deal with the situation then…hearing their groans in the dark…seeing the blood dropping from their teeth…!_ Repulsive images began to fill up her mind, so instead of panicking like she would have normally done, she did the smart thing and attempted to calm down.

_Deep breaths Mio…just breathe in slowly…and breathe out slowly…_She headed toward the window, hoping to open it for some fresh air. However, she was met with images that she would rather have kept out of her mind.

"Oh my God…" she said almost mutely as she observed the surroundings of the school. Dead bodies littered the campus in nearly every space she could spot, and the areas that were devoid of lifeless corpses were full of infected humans or zombies. Red became a dominant color as it was smeared across the gates, buildings, and grass, giving off an extreme miasma.

"Is that…a tank…?" Surely enough, in the distance, she was able to spot the heavy man-slaughtering vehicle overturned on its side. "It must be…the JSDF…" she was somehow able to determine from the very miniscule insignia on the side.

"Things can't be this serious already…can they…?" Mio said in disbelief. "…If the zombies were able to turn that tank on its side..." These weren't anything like the actual meaning of a zombie that she was aware of.

In fact, she was beginning to confuse citizens who were infected by a zombie to an actual zombie. Perhaps the true zombies infected humans through a bite…? How the infection was spread didn't really matter to her at the moment though; what did matter was how strong and dangerous these guys were, and how in hell's name she was going to get through them.

These zombies proved how powerful they were by the amount of carnage and chaos Mio could see just from the window. Just the regular infected seemed scary enough, but coming across mutated variations of them was almost unthinkable to deal with.

"I've got to get out of here!"

The bassist quickly ran away from the window, not able to handle the grotesque view. Not looking where she was going, she bumped her head into the whiteboard and fell down, along with Elizabeth.

"Oww," she cried to herself. After a quick head shake, she turned her gaze toward the doors. Those simple devices were her key out of her once peaceful prison, the gateway to her freedom. However, to reach freedom, she would need to face those obstacles that have been haunting her ever since they were mentioned by that one hair-banded girl however many hours ago.

"I can do this…I just need to believe I can…"

She continued to whisper more words of encouragement to herself to distract her from her own fear.

Reaching for the lock on the door, Ritsu's text echoed in her mind for the final time.

_If you're in the clubroom, STAY INSIDE THE CLUBROOM._

Her free right hand grasped the lock.

"I'm sorry but…"

_Click. _

"I can't let you an idiot like you…"

Her hand grasped the door knob.

"An idiot…like you…out there loose…"

She began to turn it.

"…in Zombie land…not without me at least."

With a newfound burst of adrenaline, she threw the door open behind her to find her first zombie standing right in front of it, seemingly still dumbfounded by the lock. The sound of the slam was enough to alert the zombies on the same floor and on the stairs.

However, it was too late for the first one, as Mio took this small window of opportunity to smash Elizabeth into it.

The sound of such a beautiful wooden instrument banging against the skull of a once-human infected made Mio cringe her head violently, as she imagined how much internal brain damage had been done to her victim. One of the strings vibrated across the neck and all the way to every single bone in her body.

As well as the actual sound and feel of its death, the sight of the dent mark left in its head, along with the river of scarlet blood gushing from it, drove her to want to vomit the rest of Tsumugi's cakes out onto the tile floor. It was as if she had broken a dam and now it was unleashing a tsunami of red liquid upon her shoes. Such a vision would be one she would need to grow accustomed to quickly though, seeing as how the next infected student took no hesitation in sprinting toward the temporarily stunned bassist.

Fortunately, she was able to snap herself to her senses quick enough and swing Elizabeth in the direction of the wide-mouthed monstrosity.

Her body shook, but only slightly. Her fear and hesitation from earlier were slowly being overtaken by pure adrenaline and perhaps even the thrill of the fight.

She ran down the stairs, taking advantage of the sloped ground to push the zombies down in a small pile. After she had them all gathered together, she brought her bass guitar's great, slim body upward to the sky at an exact ninety degree angle. In the next instant, she was thrashing them repeatedly as fast as her arms could allow her to do so.

Unfortunately, her boost of adrenaline had gotten the best of her, as she heard the neck of her first bass begin to crack. Hearing the sound, she quickly ceased her beating to check on its condition.

"Oh no, Elizabeth…!" she stated in disbelief after observing the amount of damage she had inflicted upon it.

That smooth and mahogany body of hers was now dented in almost every place imaginable and smeared with blood across any visible part. The neck was blood-infested as well, and most of the strings had snapped off without Mio even noticing.

She sure was lucky none of the strings had snapped right in her face. That would have hurt.

The most worrisome part though, was the split in the neck.

"She'll probably break after the next few hits…" Hearing the cry of a zombie, she instinctively swung the Fender straight at the source of the noise, earning her a now broken Elizabeth.

"Make that after one hit…" she sighed. The body fell with a great thud on the floor, unable to endure any more torture. In a normal situation, she'd probably mourn this loss for the next few weeks but this was obviously a special circumstance.

Looking down the hallway, she saw a group of about five infected humans heading her way. She turned toward the stairs, only to find another group of similar size right at the foot of the steps, examining their lost fellow brethren.

_There's too many to push past!_ Having no other way to go, she ran toward the other side of the hallway. Unfortunately, the sun's glare was in the perfect position to blind her while she was running, which led to a terrifying discovery.

"It's a dead end…" Indeed it was, as only a door lay at the end of the hall. She desperately tried to pull any nearby doors open but it was useless; they were all locked. _Is this how it's going to end for me…? _She thought despairingly. _I couldn't even make it out of the school?_

Now in a large group of ten or more, they marched toward Mio in typical classic-zombie style with their arms outstretched in front of them, hands dangling uselessly.

…_That other half of me from earlier was right, I shouldn't have left the clubroom! I shouldn't have risked myself so recklessly like that!_

Instantly, Mio began to regret every decision in her whole life that led to a bad outcome, including the time she cussed for the very first time, the time she stole Yui's strawberry off the top of her cake (she learned never to do that again the hard way), and all of the times her fist made contact with Ritsu's forehead.

_But now…it's too late…I'm dead…heh, I'm sorry Ritsu. Sorry for being so reckless and selfish…like you._

She closed her eyes so she wouldn't have the displeasure of seeing her own limbs having mutated teeth driven in them.

_Bye…_

"THREE!"

A foreign voice sounded from somewhere, and suddenly, Mio heard a loud bang.

Opening her eyes, she was met face to face with a person she had never seen before in her life. Rubbing her gray orbs to see if she was hallucinating, she noticed dark blue hair. Because of where the sun was shining, it made the girl's hair seem like a brown color.

"Yui…?" Mio called out.

"Yui? Who the hell is Yui?" the girl responded.

"Um, Kyo-chan? You might want to focus on more important matters…" another girl said barely above a whisper while meekly pointing her index finger toward the zombies.

"Oh, right. Let us save you, helpless student!" Kyo yelled, probably louder than she had intended. Immediately, she began to get down to business, along with her nameless partner, while Mio was currently stunned in her position on the floor.

_Who are these girls?_ She could only wonder because at the moment, her body wasn't obeying the commands her brain was sending to them.

Blood gushing, skulls being caved in, arms being completely shattered, and other various savage noises were all Mio's senses could register. Even her eyes were having trouble functioning at the moment because of her near-death experience. Then again, every moment of this damned apocalypse was a near-death experience.

Somehow, the pair was able to take down all of the zombies.

"Haha, all in a day's work, you sons of zombie bitches! Right, Suki-chan?"

"Um, yes. I guess so…oh, don't forget that girl in the corner!"

"Huh? Oh yeah, her!"

Mio heard footsteps headed in her directions, as her five senses began to function properly.

"Hey there fellow survivor!" Kyo called while extending her hand toward her. "My name is Kyo Amasaki, and that other girl right there is Suki Ayame. We're part of the Occult Club and we think that we know how to stop this zombie mess! So, you gonna join us or what?"

"Kyo-chan, be more gentle!" Suki scolded. "If we haven't opened the door, she would have been done for. She just went through a traumatic experience, so please don't be so straightforward!"

"Suki-chan…" _Wow_, the navy blue-haired girl thought. _Suki-chan hasn't scolded at me like that for a while now…_

"There there," Suki said soothingly. "Why don't you start off by telling us your name?"

* * *

"So, Akiyama-san," said Suki, "you said your friends are headed on their way here now?"

"Yes," Mio replied. She explained her whole situation to them, although only in the time span of five minutes since Kyo wanted to be well on her way out of the infected-infested school. "I wanted to wait for them here but…I didn't want them to risk their lives just for me. I wanted to put my life on the line too!"

"Akiyama-san, you're so brave…" Suki said in awe.

"Please call me by my first name: Mio."

"O-of course, Mio-san…"

"Yeah yeah yeah, you're worried about your friends and family and whatnot," Kyo interrupted. "So are a lot of other families but stuff like that only holds them back from surviving."

"What did you just say?" Mio asked, rage present in her voice.

"It's whatever, let's just get out of here."

"It's whatever…?" Mio repeated with disgust. Nevertheless, the trio proceeded forward, but not before the bassist had to equip herself with a leftover shovel in the Occult Club closet. The dirt on it seemed pretty fresh, which only served to make Mio think of what kind of sick ritual they could have been performing with this very shovel.

They ran into some strong resistance from the zombies, even discovering a few different types with special abilities. One case was the Hunter, which they had uncovered after reaching the first floor. It was hiding in a dark corner and lunged at Kyo with inhuman speed from the other side of the corridor. Luckily, Suki and Mio were able to smack its chest in midair before it got a good chunk of meat from her.

Along with that came the Spitter, which spat skin-burning acid onto the ground. Alone, it only would serve to be a nuisance since they'd have to take another route around the burning ground.

It wasn't exactly as Ritsu described earlier from her video game but they were pretty similar. _Haha, didn't think your stupid explanations would ever come in handy…_

Other than those special types though, it was nothing that they couldn't deal with. Mio, now feeling more confident since she had company, wasn't feeling so scared of the zombies anymore. Or at least, not _as_ scared as she was earlier.

Misery definitely did love having some fucking company.

Especially when said company had to face off against a zombie apocalypse spawned from rebirth ritual performed by some random Occult Club female member who actually thought she could tame such creatures to dominate the world.

Eventually the girls were able to make it out of the school and finally onto the streets. However, by that time, the sun had finally set, casting an even darker atmosphere around the suburban area than before. Being in the darkness revamped Mio's fear factor, as she began turn at every branch snapping, gate creaking, and leaf passing by her eyes. Although such instances were only for staying alert and careful, instead of scared and frightful.

"Aww… Are you scared already, you big-chested scaredy-cat?~"

"Ergh…" Throughout their small amount of time together, Mio was already beginning to get really pissed off at Kyo, since she was insulting her with almost every opportunity given. In fact, she had had enough of it…

"That's it! Kyo, why do you always feel the urge to irritate me all the time even though we just met?"

"Why? WHY? Because of you keep talking about your friends! There's no point in waiting for them, they'll only drag you down and become a really big fucking burden! The only thing we should be focusing on is getting the fuck out of this place!"

"What about you and Suki-chan, huh?" Mio pointed at her for emphasis. The long-haired brunette was looking troubled at the argument that arose between the two. "Why didn't you leave her behind if she would be such a 'burden'?"

"You have to ask? Then you really are an idiot! I'm not stupid enough to try and survive this damn apocalypse alone! I know I'll need SOME fucking help, like, one or two more people. Any unnecessary weight will just slow us down!"

"Um…hey girls?" Suki tried to intervene, but to no avail.

"So that's the only reason you took me? Just because you'd take any help you could get as long as your group doesn't get too big? You're supposed to help others because they're going through such a traumatic experience such as this, and you want to help them!"

"Why would I want to help them? What have they done for me?"

"We should probably get moving girls…!"

"Shut up Suki-chan, you're not involved in this!" Kyo said. At this, Suki snapped.

"THAT'S IT, you two stop arguing right NOW!" Her voice was exceptionally loud, loud enough to probably signal zombies to come their way, but she didn't care at the moment. "Kyo-chan, she's right. We shouldn't be so selfish and skip out on helping others because it's a burden! Being abandoned like that would only make this experience worse for them! You should be ashamed for even thinking like that!"

"Suki-chan…" was all Kyo was able to utter.

"I'm sorry but Mio-chan is right. If we come across other survivors, we need to listen to them, because they're suffering too."

"But Suki-chan, we need to stop this-"

"I'm going wherever Mio-chan is going to help find her friends…whether you're coming…or not!" Suki was barely able to get that last phrase out as she moved beside Mio.

"Suki," Mio started. "Thanks…but as much as I hate to say this...I'm also to blame here. I shouldn't be arguing inside our group. Fighting in a group will only lead to our…end, so-"

"Yeah, stop arguing Mio-chan," said Kyo belligerently, a rather cruel smirk on her face.

Mio turned round, eyes narrowed. "_What_ did you just say?"

"Aww, c'mon, I was kidding! Just kidding. Jeez…" Kyo sighed. "Okay, I'm sorry, I was being a total selfish bitch alright…? This is a nightmare for all of us, and I just want to stop it," her voice took a more mature tone. "Knowing that we have a chance against these zombies…it makes me want to stop this crazy shit as quick as possible…"

Silence formed between the three girls. But it was suddenly broken by an energetic Kyo.

"But of course we'll go help find your friends…like that Yui girl, right? You're absolutely right; we can't just leave them alone in this world! Us survivors gotta stick together!" Kyo then flashed a shiny smile at her.

_Weird,_ Mio thought. _She sort of reminds me of Ritsu…_"Yeah…thank you."

_Thank goodness they're on good terms now…_Suki couldn't help but sigh in relief.

"Ritsu said they were at Yui's house, which is this way, so let's head in that direction," she said while pointing.

"So let's get crackin' and tear up the hood!"

"Tear up the hood…?" Mio and Suki questioned simultaneously. Nonetheless, they continued in the direction of Yui's house. While they were walking, however, they didn't notice the black shadow that was watching their every move carefully from the rooftops above.

* * *

"Ricchan," Mugi called out.

"Oh, hey there Mugi! Whatsup?"

"Um, I don't know how else to put this…" she began twiddling her fingers in thought.

"What is it?"

"…Well, um…"

"Mugi, come on; I'm not gonna snap like earlier. I wouldn't be a good president if I did! You can tell me anything!"

"I would just appreciate it if you…if you could cease beating that zombie with its own arm…I am quite certain it is dead."

"Huh? Oh, yeah, my bad…" And thus, Ritsu finally quit hitting its neck, which was near the point of snapping and breaking off from the rest of its battered and bloodied-up body. She threw the severed arm toward the side.

"I apologize, we still need some time to grow accustomed to...um…actually killing people, despite their zombified status."

Looking behind the blonde, Ritsu could see each of the girls shivering from their previous confrontation, yet still trying to look brave. Smiling at their efforts, she then said, "Yeah, I'll tone it down a bit. I mean, I know this situation is scary and all, but I've always wanted to actually kill a zombie ever since I played _Left 4 Dead_, ya know?"

"Yes, I completely understand Ricchan."

"It's like, some kid wanting to join the army after playing a shooting game every day. Actually joining the army would probably kill your heart and soul on the inside, but games make it seem fun."

"That's because video games aren't real and you don't run any risk of getting hurt," said Azusa. "Nobody plays video games hoping they'll actually get shot or stabbed at."

"Or eaten by zombies," said Yui helpfully.

Azusa nodded. "Or eaten."

"That seems to have become a reality now, though…" said Mugi, her voice worried.

"Haha…" Ritsu gave a short laugh. "…um…anyway, yeah. I'll be a little less violent, haha…Let's keep moving…"

* * *

"It's okay Ui…don't pay any attention to the overturned cars, burning buildings, dead bodies lying around-" Yui spoke somehow in a positive manner.

"Yui-senpai, I think she gets the point."

"Oh, hehe, sorry Ui! My point is, just look at me and only me, okay?" It was as if Yui was intentionally trying to get Azusa to face-palm at her actions. Either that, or she was completely oblivious to her airheaded state. After debating about it for a few minutes, Azusa couldn't decide which one she preferred. Yet despite her shortcomings, the younger guitarist couldn't help but admire her senpai for trying to comfort Ui amidst the chaos.

"O-okay Onee-chan…I'll try," Ui was able to utter while clinging to her sister.

"Yui-senpai is right though; this place is completely fucked up right now…"

Everybody gasped.

"…what did I say?" Azusa looked around at everybody quizzically.

"Azu-nyan! Watch your words!"

"Well, since Ritsu-senpai was cussing earlier, I just wanted to try it, that's all…"

"Don't remind me of that Azusa," Ritsu stated with a stern look on her face.

"We're sorry; it just sounds very different and odd when you curse, Azusa-chan," Mugi replied.

"She's right," Ritsu agreed. "Hehe…someone's trying to act like a big girl now, huh?"

"Shut it, Ritsu-senpai!"

"I think we're getting off topic here," Ui interrupted. "Anyway, it hasn't even been one day yet, but they've caused so much destruction…" Staring in all directions, everything just looked plain dead. It was as if all of the abandoned cars and buildings and such were drained of color.

"I agree with Ui-chan," Tsumugi said. "Seeing all of this chaos makes me feel like our attempt at surviving will be in vain…" An awkward silence formed in the group. "I'm sorry everybody! I couldn't hold that in any longer, it's just really hard to feel hopeful…there are probably other people who are much more adapted for this situation than us, and even they might not survive."

"Well, if it's adapting you're worried about, look no further!" Ritsu suddenly exclaimed. "There's a tank over there at the end of the street! Let's go see if it works!"

"Yay, tanks!" Yui yelled in random happiness whilst running toward the flipped vehicle of mass destruction. Tsumugi followed the pair, leaving Azusa and Ui standing there.

"I doubt it still works," Azusa disapproved. "Plus, who knows how dangerous that tank is too? With Yui-senpai and Ritsu-senpai messing around it, I'm kind of scared for their well-being, along with their bodies."

"W-well, Azusa-chan, perhaps there may be some supplies or medical kits in there?" Ui suggested.

"Hm, good point. Well, let's join then, shall we?" With that, the two juniors joined the rest of the group.

The tank's main cannon had been forcibly ripped off and tossed to the side. The whole vehicle was on its back, with debris from the cement street barely holding it up to reveal an opened latch. Off to the side was a small insignia indicating this belonged to the JSDF.

In front of the tank there was a big line of tossed about cars and debris, turning it into a one-way street. The destruction itself didn't frighten Azusa; not as much as the sort of creatures that could cause such destruction. _Ritsu-senpai said there was a really strong zombie, a big "Tank" zombie that would throw cars at you in the game. This looks way worse than the way she described it though…how would we be able to deal with that kind of infected…?_ While she pondered more and more about this sort of zombie type, Ritsu and Yui seemed pretty intrigued by its interior.

"Ricchan, it's so high-tech in here!" Yui exclaimed from the inside.

"Hold on, let me see!" Ritsu called out as she entered through the hatch.

"Be careful!" Tsumugi and Ui reminded them.

"Yeah yeah!" It was almost as if the brunettes were sisters by their similar personalities and responses.

After some exploring of the tanks broken interior, the girls managed to find a few useful tools inside that could help aid them in their journey toward Sakuragaoka. There was an assault rifle, which Ritsu claimed to be called a "SCAR" or something similar, with a few magazine rounds attached to a blet, as well as two handguns with full clips. Much to Ritsu's displeasure, however, there were no grenades.

"I would have a lot of fun with those too…" she whined. "Explosions always make things better…"

"Only Michael Bay thinks that, Ritsu-senpai."

"Ugh, don't ever speak that name Azusa."

"The JSDF respond quickly, don't they?" Tsumugi found how often their conversations went off-track.

"It's a zombie outbreak, of course they would!"

"B-but if the zombies were able to kill even them, how on earth can we sur-" Ui started, but was interrupted.

"Stop worrying so much Ui!" Yui said happily. "If you keep that sort of attitude then we really won't make it to Mio-chan…Anyway, remember! A positive attitude will get us through anything!" Although it was typical of Yui to say something like this no matter what the situation, something about her happy-go-lucky expression seemed off at the moment.

Nonetheless, Ritsu was glad that she didn't have to spend the next ten minutes raising the group's morale again so she raised her fist along with Yui.

"I agree with Yui-chan! Being negative is not going to help us. I know we'll be able to save Mio, and somehow get out of here!"

"Don't give up Ui-chan! Keep your hopes up!" Azusa and Tsumugi soon joined one after the other. The next second, Ui already had a smile on her face.

"Thank you, everyone. I'm so glad to have such helpful friends like you…" Ui began to tear up, at least until she heard that same roar from earlier. Only this time, it sounded closer.

Closer.

Louder.

And much more threatening.

"Oh no…" Everybody was thinking the same thought, but Ritsu was the only person able to verbally express it. "It can't be… That's not fair! We're not even halfway through this level! Uh…I mean, to the school!"

"Commander Ricchan, I don't think this is the time for jokes." The rest of the group nodded along with the Yui.

"Good point Private…"

The roar became louder and louder, heading in the direction of the girls from the other side of the blocked off road. They could literally feel the ground shake from every step taken by the great beast.

"Well senpai, I hope all of that shooting in _Left 4 Dead_ wasn't a complete waste of time…"

"Well, it's point and shoot, right? That's all it takes!" If she wasn't so frightened right now, Azusa would so raise an eyebrow at Ritsu. "But with Tanks…usually I just ran for the nearest safe house."

Looking around, Ritsu desperately tried searching for an escape route. Unfortunately, it was now a one way street with all of the wreckage blocking one side. She couldn't spot any alleys to run at first glance since they were all blocked by cars. _Oh son of a Keith Moon, really though?_ She thought. Looking closer though, she found that there were two alleyways that they'd be able to go through if they vaulted over the cars fast enough. Doing a quick game of eenie-meanie-minie-mo, she chose the path on the right.

"EVERYBODY, head to the alleyway to the right!" Ritsu yelled.

The group didn't hesitate at all; they immediately sprinted for it at fast as they could, completely scared while doing so.

Too bad for them, the Tank barged through the broken debris, blocking the path toward the dark and narrow alley.

"HEAD FOR THE ONE TO THE LEFT!" Ritsu shouted while changing direction. While doing so, she got a pretty up-close-and-personal view of the Tank.

Giving off a powerful roar, the whole beast of what was once a human looked threatening as fuck. First off, the body was noticeably more colossal than any man or woman on this planet, at about eight feet high. Its arm and leg muscles looked similar to that of those people in fake commercials that promised a six pack in a week, but they were even _bigger- _if such a thing were even possible. The Tank's head was miniscule in comparison to the rest of its body, its hands were covered with the flesh of unfortunate people that fell to this great beast, and blood was splattered all over its chest. Seriously; it still seemed fresh in how it was dripping from its everywhere. Another unnerving detail that wasn't in the video game was how there were several bones protruding from one elbow, its knees, and even its back.

And the girls had thought it reasonable to be scared of a couple of _normal _zombies…this Tank proved to be beyond any nightmare that their minds would be able to produce.

Staring at the group fleeing from it, the Tank immediately stampeded at them like a locomotive train running late after their conductor spent the morning getting drunk on gallons of beer wondering how their life came to this. Only this train would not only smash into them, breaking possibly every single bone in their body, along with their organs, but would most likely feast on their remains for dinner as well.

Ritsu was partly right though. Point and shoot were basically the only things you needed to know for operating a gun. Operating a gun _efficiently_, however, was a much different story. Nevertheless, Ritsu held her assault tightly in her arms, imitated the soldiers and survivors she saw in her video games, and pulled the trigger.

The amount of recoil was much more than she had anticipated. Add the fact that she was sprinting while spraying only made her accuracy worse. Fortunately, it wasn't very hard to miss a behemoth such as the Tank due to its large size.

"HAH, YOU LIKE THAT BITCH?" she yelled as the monster's pace was beginning to slow at the amount of bullets being shot into its body.

"Ritsu-senpai, please stop cussing!" Azusa scolded despite running away for her dear life.

"Oh come on, I'm just having fun!"

"I agree with Azusa-chan; we're not used to it and it sounds odd."

"Agreed!" Yui and Ui said together.

"Jeez, what's wrong with a little fun when we're in a zombie apoca-"

She wasn't able to finish her sentence.

Only one of the bullets she had fired, just one, had managed to wedge its way into the Tank's tiny left eye. Temporarily blinded, the Tank went on a rampage, its mere footsteps causing huge cracks and crevices to appear on the cement street. Because of its confused state, it did one of the only things it could do well: throw shit.

It picked up a light post and, just ever so conveniently, threw it right at the group.

However, fortunately, the girls were spaced out perfectly for the object to not crush any of their brittle spines. But…

"Ricchan!" Yui called out from one side. "Ricchan, help! It's too tall to climb!"

"Yui-senpai, just run!" Azusa called from the opposite side of the pole. It had separated the girls with Azusa, Ritsu, and Tsumugi on one side, and the Hirasawa sisters on the other. "The Tank's confused right now; use this as an opportunity to get away!"

"B-b-b-but! Azu-nyan! Ricchan! Mugi-chan! Will I ever see you again?"

"Yui, just get the heck out of there!"

"Ricchan…"

"ONEE-CHAN!" Turning around, she saw a stern look on her younger sister's face, one which she had never seen before. Plus, the demanding tone of her voice was completely foreign to her. "I'm sorry for the outburst, but we have to listen to them!"

"B-but…they…"

"We have to go now Onee-chan!"

"Listen to Ui-chan, Yui-chan!" she heard Tsumugi call out. "We'll all regroup at the school!"

Taking a moment to recollect her thoughts, Yui agreed. Ritsu's group rushed through the dark and very uninviting alleyway while Yui and Ui ran back the way they came. Anything to get away from that monster.

While the pair was scampering away, nearly tripping on the abundance of debris, they could hear the Tank cry out in severe pain, echoing across the entire city.

* * *

The girls didn't care where they were going at this point; they ran in any direction that seemed to get them farther away from the Tank.

Eventually, they ended up resting beside the mall that they visited frequently. Sitting down on the benches, they felt exhausted after running such a long distance.

"U-Ui…this…is even worse…than the marathon…" Yui was barely able to speak from lack of breath.

"O-Onee-chan…we did it…though…! We got away…from the monster…" Ui said, her voice strained from all the running she'd done.

"B-but…Ricchan…Mugi-chan…"

"And Azusa-chan…"

"We're all separated…" At this point, something in Yui cracked and shattered like glass. She got down on her knees and bawled her feelings out, which was difficult considering how hard it was to breathe. She retreated when she noticed the amount of green bile next to her, not even wanting to know whether it came from a human or zombie. "Ui! I can't…we can't do this!"

"Onee-chan…just listen…to Tsumugi-san. She said were going to meet at the school, so we will."

"But how're we supposed to get through THAT thing! And those other zombies?"

"Weren't you the one who told me that a positive attitude can get us through anything?"

"…Yeah…but-"

"Then no buts!" Ui stated with confidence. "We're still able to run, so we still have a chance of surviving AND saving Mio-san." She reached her hand over to Yui's pocket. "We still even have Ritsu-san's handgun…we can do this, Onee-chan."

_Ui…_It was this moment that Yui realized how much Ui had sacrificed her entire life just for her sister. Cooking for her, washing clothes for her, comforting her, and even bathing her when they were little. She did all of these things for Yui and asked nothing in return. She finally realized how much Ui was acting like the older sister all the time, and how she would be classified as the clumsy little sister.

_You've always been a good sister to me…_

"Onee-chan…?"

_And now…I must return the favor._

"Ui," Yui called.

"Yes?" she asked, caught off by her sudden speaking.

"We're…in a mall now, so maybe there are some supplies that we can find…you know, like food. I didn't really get a chance to try your hotpot."

"Hehe, how about I try to find you some cotton candy then, eh?"

"Hehe, thanks Ui, but…we can't waste our time on small things like that," Yui said in a surprisingly serious tone. "We should just try to find anything that might help us, like a baseball bat, club, or even a gun. And head to Sakuragaoka, pronto."

"…Yeah, you're right."

_Ui…I'm not going to let us die…not yet._

* * *

**A/N**: So this chapter ended up being longer than I anticipated, but I guess that's good for you readers since you get to read more. Anyway, thanks for the reviews. They've really been keeping me going, so if it's not too much trouble, just go ahead and click the review button and…well, review.


	5. Reuniting in the Metal of Death

**A/N**: This is by far the longest chapter I've ever posted on here. Also, this is by the far the longest I've taken to update this story. Sorry about that. Stupid real-life problems. But anyway, I hope that this chapter's length won't be too boring to read through. Oh yeah, and I suppose this could count as a happy birthday present for Ritsu, so happy birthday!

* * *

"Onee-chan, I don't like the feel for this place…" It's not like being outside in the open felt comfortable either, but it was just so dark in the mall.

"Don't worry Ui! As long as we stick together, we'll be okay!" Yet, a certain girl's smile and words of encouragement shined in the dim atmosphere of the shopping center.

"I'm sorry, but it's just hard to keep such thoughts in the back of my head when a place that's supposed to be lively seems so…_d-dead…_" Indeed it was. With every store's lights cut off from any sort of electrical power and dead corpses of innocent people littered around with infected humans feasting upon their rotting carcasses, "dead" would an extreme understatement to say the least.

"Then think happier thoughts! Think about cakes and chocolate…and ice cream…and…" The Hirasawa's tummy began rumbling softly, as opposed to how serious she looked. "And tea…and cotton candy…and…cakes and…um…"

Yui groaned in a manner that would most likely cause one to faint from the overwhelming amount of cute-ness, if the accompanying expression of yearning wasn't enough.

"I'm so hungry Ui!"

The younger sister could only laugh at elder's frustration, happy that throughout this seemingly endless day, there were still traces of the care-free airhead left. However, with every laugh of enjoyment, she always seemed to stop abruptly and stare off to the side.

"Ui…is something wrong…?" Yui asked with a puzzled expression. _She has that look from before…_she thought. _Ui, you can tell me if something's wrong…_

"Oh…um, it's nothing…! I'm just worried about everybody else…" she assured, albeit glancing side to side suspiciously.

Gazing at her with a skeptical look, Yui decided to shrug it off, as she too was worried about her friends. "Yeah, I really hope we'll regroup with them too Ui…"

_Still…_Her eyes wandered off into the stars above. _I can't help…but think…that's not what's worrying her the most…_

"Onee-chan, watch out!" Activating reflexes that were long hidden unless in cases of dire need, Yui instantly ducked as Ui swung her frying pan to a zombie that was creeping silently behind the guitarist. Despite how dark and dim most of the mall appeared, the central pathway was located under sky lights, which assisted Ui in spotting the stealthy infected before it was too late.

"Ui…" Yui muttered, unable to come up with any complete sentence.

"You're welcome, Onee-chan," Ui said with a light smile.

"Oh, hehe, thanks!" _I'm so thankful that Ui is a great sister to me…but I'm the older one…I should be watching out for her! I don't want her to always take care of me all the time. I've gotta return the favor. _"I owe you so much Ui!"

"Oh no, you don't owe me anything…" Ui lied ever so obviously. After practically nurturing and tending to her sister's every need, Yui was in debt to her more than she could pay back.

_Seeing you smile whenever I take care of you is enough…_Ui thought. _As long as I have you, then I'll always be happy. That's why, even though you're the older sister, I want to protect-_

_**BAAAANG!**_

An explosive gunshot separated Ui from her thoughts as it resonated throughout the miasmic environment. She turned behind her to find a zombie on the floor, a fresh bullet puncture in its brain.

"And now we're even!" Yui said after lowering her side-arm. "You can't always care for me, you know! I have to protect you too!"

Wanting to embrace her sister in congratulatory fashion, Ui instead held her arms to herself, resisting the urge to break out in joy.

"Onee-chan" she began to scold. "Try to let me do most of the work! We want to conserve ammo for your handgun; only use it in dire emergencies, okay?"

"Eh? I don't get a 'thank you'?" Turning around while faking an expression of hurt, Ui couldn't hold in her euphoria any longer.

She laughed. Laughed while she felt happiness surge through her.

The laughter proved to be contagious as Yui began laughing with her. Until she started to choke from forcing the air down the wrong pipe in her throat, which in turn caused Ui to laugh even more.

"Okay, fair enough," Ui managed to say after many long minutes of giggling. "Thank you Onee-chan."

"You're welcome! But you do make a good point though…" Yui said with a contemplative face. "How about you take the gun and I'll take your pan, okay?"

Ui began looking nervous. "B-but…I don't want you to get hurt…"

"Ui, you've been taking care of me for a very long time now! Probably longer than I can remember. So now it's my turn to take care of you! It's only fair, right?"

After seeing her sister's beautiful and shiny smile under the moonlight, she agreed. _That smile of yours gets me every time…_

* * *

After about ten minutes of walking under the skylights while simultaneously thrusting pans into any infected in sight, Yui came across a point of interest that she believed would be exceedingly beneficial to her and Ui.

"Hey look, there's the cake shop!" Well, beneficial to her raging stomach anyway.

"C-c-c-cake...sh-sh-shop…?"

"Yeah, let's go over there and see if they have some leftover sweets for me!"

"NO! Wait!"

Halting, Yui stared at her small sister to see an expression that was undeniably one of horror. "Oh come on Ui, we're just going to stop by really quick!"

"P-p-please Onee-chan, l-l-let's keep m-moving on!" Confused about why stopping by a shop full of sweets for a measly minute was so bad, she turned her body to see Ui face to face.

"But there's not a lot of zombies around there, so it's nothing we can't handle! Besides, when we meet up with Ricchan and the rest of them, they might be hungry! And now's my chance to get them some food!"

"N-no, I st-still don't think it's s-safe!" Yui gazed at her sister's eyes. It was plainer than the night sky that Ui had a separate reason for not wanting to visit the store full of treats that begged to be eaten by their goddess Yui-chan.

"Well, I still don't see the danger in it, so I'm going to go visit there," she said, determined to find out what her sister was hiding.

"No!" Ui grabbed Yui's arm with a strong grip. "Let's just focus on getting out of here and regrouping with Ritsu-san and the rest!"

"Aw, but I'm hungry, and it'll help if I get some food!" Pulling her arm free, she ran towards the shop to fill her tummy with some much needed sugar.

_No, she can't reach the store! I can't let her see…what happened…_Ui thought as she sprinted in the direction of Yui.

"Onee-chan, please stop!" she called out. It was useless though; Yui was bent on getting her cake. Oh, and finding out why seeing the cake shop was very worrisome for her too.

"What the…" the guitarist muttered as she set foot inside the gallery of sweets. This place had a lot of cake, that's for sure. However, most of these delightful deserts were tossed on the floor, leaving a doughy and frosty mess. This wasn't what caused Yui's speechlessness though.

What did cause the air to seem even more lifeless than it was before was the amount of deceased and chewed up corpses that lay around across each shelf. It seems the zombies had already stopped by here to get their meal. Yui couldn't help but feel pity for the poor shoppers who wanted nothing more than just a small, tasty snack and was instead ripped apart by these horrible, flesh-eating demons from Hell.

As she looked upon the bodies with grief, her eyes led her to a girl that emitted a sense of familiarity.

_Is…that…_

Her eyes further inspected the girl's face.

_No, it can't be her…please…don't be her…_

There was no doubt in the rational part of her mind. She could recognize those pair of red glasses from a mile away.

"Nodoka…chan…?"

As she kneeled on the floor to take a closer look at her dead friend, Ui could only gasp in horror at the grisly sight. Nodoka's body was severed in half, her two legs tossed onto a counter. What remained attached to her lower torso was torn to shreds, the remnants of her intestines flowing freely out of her tummy area and across the cold tile floor, the blood that spilled out of them all dried up now. Each and every one of Nodoka's major organs looked as if a zombie took a bite out of them, as if it were sampling them to see which one was the tastiest.

Luckily, her face was left untouched, only containing a few scratches around the cheeks. It was still sickening though; the top portion of her body looked spotless and in good condition but if one scrolled their eyes just a tad bit downward, they would find a gory sight that would make anybody sick to the stomach.

Ui had almost thrown up when being taught about human anatomy. With this corpse in front of her, it was obvious that she couldn't hold back the urge this time. She allowed her stomach's contents to become one with the outside once more.

"Nodoka-chan…" Yui repeated as Ui ceased her vomiting. Tears flowed from her face and onto the lenses of her best friend's glasses.

"O-Onee-chan…" Ui mumbled. "I'm…I'm so sorry…"

No response came from the guitarist. She only stayed in her kneeling position, eyes letting salty tears cascade in small rivers.

"This is…all my fault…" Ui began to cry.

"Ui…" Yui spoke softly in a dull tone her sister had never heard her use before. "Don't blame yourself. It's not like you killed her…"

"No, you don't understand!" She managed to say between sobs.

"She didn't deserve to die…Nodoka-chan…" Yui's lone body started shaking intensely, but she composed her quickly. "But then again, I don't think I've never done anything bad enough to deserve this apocalypse either. And I know for a fact that you don't deserve this either."

"Onee-chan…" Ui felt as if her heart was ripped out when she heard Yui speak.

Turning around to face her sister, the ponytailed brunette noticed Yui's sorrowful eyes.

"Life…is so unfair Ui!" She bent her head downward as if she was going to sob further. "Ugh, no tears are coming out…_" _she grumbled in frustration.

"Onee-chan…this is my fault though…"

"No, don't blame yourself for this Ui…"

"But…_it really was my fault_," she whispered grimly.

"What?" Yui lifted her head up immediately at this statement.

"You see…" she took a moment to compose herself and spoke. "Nodoka-san was supposed to be with me at home, to help me cook the hotpot for you girls. On the way home…we stopped by to buy that triple layer chocolate cake you loved so much…That's when…_they _attacked."

Yui's heart skipped a beat and nearly stopped. "The zombies…they did this…to her…?" she whispered while stroking Nodoka's face with her hand.

"A whole horde of them charged through the mall, and we were caught in the crowd. I told her to take my hand, and we ran out of the shop. But then, one of…_them _caught her with its tongue…I tried to pull her back…I really did! But the other people in the mall ran into me, and I lost my grip…The crowd was running the opposite direction of Nodoka-san, so I wasn't able to go back to help her…"

"Ui…"

"And yet…I feel as if it was all my fault!" It was now Ui's turn to cry.

"So that's why you've been so sad lately," Yui thought aloud. "Ui," she began, and then stopped. Clearly, the death of her best friend was still taking a big toll on her heart, but she wasn't going to let that stop her from comforting her sister. "…You know you tried to help Nodoka-chan…and even if you went back for her, you might have…died…and I know she wouldn't want that."

"But still, if I hadn't let her go-"

"You couldn't help it, the crowd caused you to lose your grip!" Her raise in volume caused Ui to jump in surprise. "I'm sorry Ui…just, please don't be so hard on yourself…I know wherever Nodoka-chan is, she's happy you're still alive."

"…Onee-chan…I…Th-thank you...I couldn't ask…for a better sister than you!"

"Oh, you're making me blush Ui, hehe…" Yui didn't have enough time to blush in modesty though; a loud roar echoed from down the mall.

"Onee-chan, let's go!"

As Yui was running through the small store towards the front door, she halted and looked back at Nodoka's body.

"Onee-chan, we have to get out of here!"

"I can't just leave her like this…" Yui stated.

Despite wanting to give the responsible dead president a proper funeral, she knew that wouldn't be possible. Taking her body would obviously be too troublesome and could eventually lead to Yui falling behind and getting cornered, so the next best thing she did was leave a makeshift memorial for the student council president.

She set a small cupcake with a chestnut on top beside Nodoka's head. "Rest in peace…Nodoka-chan…"

After that, the two grabbed their respective weapons and sprinted out of the store and toward the exit that would lead them toward the school. Turning her head for a split second, Yui noticed the vast amount of infected tailing them. _There must be hundreds of them or something! _Although that was slightly an exaggeration, there certainly were a huge amount of zombies that justified her hyperbole.

"O-Onee-chan...how many of them are there…?" Ui asked while running for dear life.

"Just don't look back, okay? We're going to be alright!"

As they dashed down the seemingly endless moonlit corridor, more zombies seemed to catch onto the "EAT DOSE TOO HYUMAN BISHES!" idea and joined the rest of their infected brethren in the chase. It was moments like these that Yui wished she could have given a little more effort in increasing her stamina in P.E. lessons. Her legs were still near fatigued from running away earlier, and her tummy was still growling in discontent because she didn't eat yet. If it wasn't for the unquestionable fate of death that lie ten of fifteen feet behind her, she would have let her body collapse on the ground in exhaustion.

_I have to keep going though! Nodoka-chan would want us to survive!_ At that point, Yui noticed a weird feeling. _What is this…what am I feeling right now…?_ This feeling wanted to turn back and charge against these zombies head-on, despite how obviously idiotic of an idea that would be.

_Is this…what they call "anger"…? _She wondered. _Eww, I don't like how it feels! Go away Anger; I don't like you! _This angry feeling refused to leave easily. In fact, it began to take on a voice.

_Don't you want to take out all of those stupid zombies though?_ It said. _They deserve it if they hurt Nodoka-chan, right?_

"Ergh…but…I…uh…" Yui was never the best at arguing, even against herself.

"Onee-chan, is something wrong?" Ui managed to say between breaths while running.

"Oh, it's nothing!" Yui assured. She almost tripped after losing her breath for a short moment. _Anger, please go away! I don't like the way you make me feel! _

Eventually, the sisters were able to make it outside, locking the doors by driving a board in between the steel handles. Thank God that these zombies suck at opening doors, let alone a locked one. But sadly, the Hirasawa's had more mutated company waiting for them outside too.

"Ui, watch out!" Yui pushed her sister out of the way of incoming green goo, akin to the kind that Ritsu had told her about when discussing zombie types.

"Onee-chan, that must be the 'Spitter' that Ritsu-san was talking about!" Ui pointed out.

This zombie's appearance was about as mutated and fucked up as the Tank, in its own way anyway. Along with the multiple lack of a few limbs, blood splattered across from neck to leg, its eyes didn't contain any pupils, and its whole body seemed to be stretched an extra three feet taller, with various holes in its neck and arms. Its teeth were seething with the green acid that Ritsu told them about, along with various bugs and chunks of flesh.

It kept on spitting at the girls from its spot atop an RV, with the girls almost stepping in the goo on many occasions.

"Ui, look!" Yui shouted. In front of them was a giant horde of maybe thirty infected, all of them staring at the girls.

Suddenly, a pool of acid surrounded them as the normal infected closed in on them. The Spitter trapped them in its acid while Yui pointed out the horde.

"Well Ui, I hope what Ricchan said about shooting a gun was as easy as it sounded…" Yui said while raising her pan.

Having about as much experience as Ritsu had with shooting games (she'd always play them whenever Yui went out with friends; it was a guilty pleasure of hers), she took out the handgun. Ui began shooting at the Spitter first to avoid getting burned painfully. Luckily, she had gotten a few headshots on the giant monster, effectively taking it down.

Turning around, she noticed how the normal infected could only reach their blood-stained arms at them, due to the pool of green acid that still surrounded them. The zombies that had less of a brain compared to the others ran straight at the girls but soon burned up in the intense liquid.

Seeing this as a perfect opportunity to take some of them out, Yui reached out her pan and slammed about five of them in the face, skulls most likely caving in on their zombie brains.

"Hehe, yes!" Yui exclaimed in excitement. Soon, she and Ui were taking out zombie after zombie with their weapons, this acid proving to actually save them. "We can survive the zombie apocalypse Ui, we _can_ survive the zombie apocalypse Ui!"

Soon, the horde of zombies had been taken down after a few beatings to the head by cold and blood-stained steel. Bullet holes through the cranium helped in taking them down as well. The acid around soon faded, allowing the girls to leave that circle of hell.

"We did it!" they shouted into the sky while high-fiving each other.

"Onee-chan, you were so good out there!" Ui praised.

"Oh Ui, I'm just trying to protect my younger sister! I am your Onee-chan after all, right?"

This moment of celebration was soon ruined as the giant zombie horde inside the mall burst through the doors. Yui's earlier exaggeration proved to be true; there literally were almost a hundred of them charging at them.

When the two sisters felt they were going to have to outrun them again, they heard the sound of a car horn honk from across the corner.

Suddenly, a maroon van drove across the parking lot, the driver shooting from the inside of their seat with an assault rifle. Turning their attention towards this newcomer, the infected charged toward her car.

Their ambitions were met with a grenade. And another grenade. And another.

Yui and Ui watched in amazement as they saw about ten zombies explode into bloody messes of human chunks.

"Wait, is that…?" Yui thought out loud. "Ui, don't you recognize that van?"

"…Onee-chan…you're right, I do!"

The death metal scream that came from attached speakers on the outside of the van, along with the accompanying sound of Death Devil's song _LOVE_ playing, confirmed their suspicions.

"YOU ALL ARE GOING TO FUCKING ZOMBIE HELL FOR THIS, BITCHES!"

"Ui, it's Sawa-chan!" Yui yelled in amazement.

* * *

It took plentiful amounts of running through multiple dark alleys, but the trio of Azusa, Tsumugi, and RItsu finally managed to lose the Tank that had been hot on their trail after the drummer had accidentally shot its eye out. However, the headband-less brunette didn't exactly pay attention as to where she was leading her small group towards and ended up in a very familiar place.

"Forest of the marathon, we meet again…" she was barely able to say between gasps of air.

"We might…have lost that thing, but Yui-senpai…and Ui…" Azusa whispered in despair, also struggling to breathe.

"Is everybody alright?" Tsumugi asked, seemingly unfazed by the amount of sprinting it took to escape.

"Oh come on Mugi, how are you not out of breath?" Ritsu exclaimed. "You didn't have this much stamina back at the marathon!"

"Oh, right! After I realized how low my stamina was at that time, I began to undergo training exercises to increase it. It seems that they were very effective, hehe…"

"Oh just forget it." The drummer then sat herself down on the grassy ground, long and unruly bangs covering her amber eyes. "It's hopeless guys…"

"Ritsu-senpai, don't say that!" the twin-tailed guitarist said loudly. "We still need to save Mio-senpai, as well as regroup with Yui-senpai and the others!"

"Azusa-chan is right!" Tsumugi joined. "If you keep an attitude like that, we really won't be able to survive through this."

"WHAT THE HELL'S THE POINT OF EVEN TRYING ANYMORE?" Her sudden outbreak caught the two off guard. "I already caused Mio to separate from us, and if it wasn't for my stupid aim, we wouldn't have gotten separated from Yui and Ui and…! And…and…"

"But senpai, those were all acci-"

"I just…I just give up. There's no point in trying if I just keep messing things up like this…"

Things became silent in the forest, apart from the slight breeze that rustled the leaves in the dark trees. Moonlight was scarce in their area, allowing any wandering infected to sneak its way onto three meals for the night. However, the zombies were the last thing on Azusa and Tsumugi's mind.

This apocalypse was slowly taking its toll on everybody. Ui had been completely silent when they arrived at her house. It wasn't long before Yui's smile would begin to crack under this catastrophe either. And now, their own Ritsu was losing her motivation.

The same Ritsu who had always been energetic, lively, and positive in the darkest of situations.

Their president who led them through every song with a powerful beat.

The stress was finally starting to throw the drummer off her rhythm.

"Ricchan…you haven't been messing things up. You're a great leader! You kept your cool even in the face of danger after we left Yui-chan's house!"

"Mugi, do you have _any_ idea how fucking hard it is to be the leader?"

When no reply came from the stunned blonde, Ritsu continued. "Everybody always looks up to you…they expect you to lead them through anything and everything! It doesn't matter how hard or impossible it may seem, they still expect you to get them through it! Do you know how much pressure that is…? How much pressure I have to deal with…?"

"Ritsu-senpai, we're _all _going through a tough time right now! You're not the only one hurting!" Azusa retaliated, her mind clearly worried about her best friend and closest senpai.

"You aren't the reason Mio is not with us! You aren't the reason that Yui and Ui aren't with us! YOU AREN'T THE REASON WHY OUR GROUP FELL APART, NAKANO!" Ritsu's voice was cracking because of how loud she was yelling.

"STOP IT!" The two turned to look at the normally quiet and calm Tsumugi. "Don't yell you two…I can't stand to see…us fall apart like this…" her cerulean eyes began to shed tears onto the forest floor.

"Mugi…I'm sorry…but…I'm just done with this…"

Everything became silent for a minute.

"…Done…?" Azusa and Tsumugi questioned aloud.

"Yes…done," the drummer's voice lowered to a near inaudible voice. "Done with playing _Left 4 Dead_ in real life…done with this stupid apocalypse…and done with trying to lead us through the impossible."

Slowly, Ritsu raised the SCAR rifle and attempted to point it at her head.

"Ricchan, don't do it!" Tsumugi shouted.

"She's right, think carefully about the consequences before doing this!"

"What consequences…? I'll finally be able to relax in peace."

"Think about how sad Mio-senpai will be…!"Ritsu flinched at the comment, but kept the gun raised.

"I just want to end all of this stress…it's too much for me…all you girls have been some of the best friends I could have ever asked for…but I guess all good things come to an end, huh?" Unfortunately, suicide by an assault rifle proved to be a bit more difficult than by a handgun. "Agh, I can't reach the trigger like this…" she said in frustration while struggling to reach her right arm further towards her death.

The keyboardist and guitarist sighed in relief. At least until they noticed that Ritsu was staring intently at both of them.

"One of you guys…do it for me."

"Ritsu-senpai," Azusa started, her eyes overflowing with tears. "You can't be serious! There's no possible way we can do it-"

She interrupted herself mid-sentence as Tsumugi stepped forward and reached her arms toward Ritsu's gun. Both the drummer and guitarist were stunned, yet the keyboardist kept her head down and her bangs to shield her eyes.

"Ricchan…" she muttered near inaudibly as her arms raised the gun at Ritsu's head.

_Holy hell, what the heck am I thinking? I'm too young and scared to die!_ One side of the sandy-haired brunette thought. _Well, this is the easiest way out! …I'll finally be released from all of this stress…_

Azusa cries of protest were ignored as Tsumugi stared at her friend's forehead through the iron sights.

_Ricchan…I am so…so sorry…but…_

"Mugi-senpai, what are you thinking? Don't do it!"

_I can't let things go on like this…_

The same hands that were used to delicately wield a teapot and kettle pulled the trigger on the assault rifle.

_**BANG BAAANG!**_

A couple of rounds fired from the assault rifle with the sounds echoing throughout the whole forest.

Not being able to handle the death of one of her closest friends, Azusa had closed her eyes and plugged her ears up with her hands. Upon opening her eyelids, she found the drummer to be unscathed and free of any bullet holes

However, a nearby zombie behind the tree Ritsu was laid back against fell onto the ground with dark scarlet blood leaking from its head.

"Ricchan, I'm sorry but…I'm not going to let you end it for yourself like this!" Tsumugi stated clearly after shooting the zombie. "I need you Ricchan…Azusa-chan needs you…all of us need you!"

"B-but…I…" Ritsu inability to come up with a complete sentence prompted the blonde to continue.

"_Mio-chan_ needs you. She needs you to save her…she's waiting for all of us to save her. _All_ of us Ricchan!"

"I c-can't…I've been so-"

"You're our drummer and our president! You've led us through many songs with your lively and energetic beats, and all of our concerts turn out wonderful because of you! You'd be the one that would always keep her smile in the darkest of situations! You were the one who was encouraging us to keep our spirits high when we left Yui-chan's house!"

"She's right," the twin-tailed kouhai followed. "Don't you remember your promise? After that first fight, you made us promise. Promise to give it our all! And that if we die, we die with a bang! It would be selfish of you to make us promise this, yet go against it yourself, right?"

"Azusa…Mugi…"

"If we aren't able to persist through this apocalypse and remain alive…" Tsumugi started.

"Then let's at least end our lives together, as a band," Azusa finished. "As a family…"

The pair extended both of their hands toward their president. Morale now restored, Ritsu gladly pulled herself up from the ground with their help.

"You two…are really the best. Mugi, you're right. Even if I made a few mistakes as a leader lately, I can't just break down because of it. I need to focus on the present…focus on saving Mio."

She turned toward the junior. "And Azusa, heh, I did promise that, didn't I? Thanks for reminding me about that! You know how I am, I forget things easily…" Ritsu said while rubbing her head sheepishly. "You girls are right though; if we do end up dying, we'll die together. It's conflicts and struggles like these that cause the survivor groups in zombie movies to end up…well, not surviving. Which is why, I promise that I'll try my best to lead us through this! I promise I won't break down like this ever again!"

With renewed vim and vigor, the three beamed at each other, glad that everybody was all happy again.

"Alright, now it's time to get to business!" Ritsu yelled, her signature personality shining through. A nearby inhuman growl caused the girls to pick up their respective weapons. "And I know just where to start…" Pans and assault rifle raised, the three charged at the unlucky pair of zombies that happened to be in the path of destruction that was Mugi, Azusa, and their leader Ritsu.

* * *

Zombie after zombie fell underneath the blade of the raven-color-esque-haired girl's katana. She continued her rampage of slashing, slicing, and thrusting as the other two girls in her group dealt with any undead that came at her from a blind spot. Such an instance would cause the inhuman human to be met with blunt force from a broom and metal pole.

If time had been rewinded by about half an hour, Akiyama Mio would most likely have fallen victim to the zombie apocalypse without scoring a single hit. But after a few pep talks with herself, along with the support of Kyo Amasaki and Suki Ayame, her fear of the pale and flesh-thirsty creatures that stalked the city had been resolved.

Soon, she felt slight satisfaction as the expertly crafted sword continued to puncture through the organs and limbs of zombies. Of course, her normal "scaredy-cat" personality would quickly follow through with an expression of nauseation.

"Heh, you bitch!" Kyo yelled as she gave the final infected a smack to the face with cold steel, adding further to the amount of blood already present on her uniform. "Go back to your hole in the graveyard where you belong!"

Deadpanning at first, Mio soon found herself smiling at her newfound friend's victory shout. "Oi, we're still quite a ways from Yui's house." _Still far from Ritsu..._

"Hey, you're lucky that I'm even coming with you to her house. If it wasn't for Suki turning on me, we would have left you to deal with this yourself. Not to mention that _I'm _the one whofound that awesome katana stuck in some dude's chest on the way here."

"I'm sorry, Kyo-chan," Suki said, a tinge of sadness apparent in her voice. "But...I want to help save others too. We can't just leave Mio-chan to save them herself; we have to save them too!"

"I know, I know Suki-chan! We already went over this at the school. I'm already on board with you girls! "

"Kyo, watch out!" Mio called out, staring in horror at the zombie that was about to chomp on her neck.

Kyo simply moved her right arm and made a forceful impact with her metal pole against the zombie's mouth. "It'd probably make me feel really guilty later anyway if we just left Big Boob's friends behind anyway."

_She continued the conversation as if nothing happened_...Mio thought. "Wait, I have a name you know!"

"Please show her some respect, Kyo-chan!"

"Yeesh, alright! It's just a joke Mio-chan! Just a joke!" Kyo smiled at her while throwing up a quick peace sign with her hand.

_It was a very crude joke though_. She sighed in exasperation as the group continued to press forward, despite the near overwhelming urge to bump Kyo on the head similar to how she does to Ritsu.

Mio soon found her mind wandering to her friends with that thought. "We're coming Ritsu...just, wait a bit longer..."

"But aren't we saving more than just Tainaka-san?" Suki's calm voice interrupted Mio's vocally expressed thoughts. "You want to save everybody in your club, right?"

"Well, yeah...it's just that...Ritsu and I..." the bassist looked around, eyes scanning the area for any zombies that intended to chew their brains from out of their skulls, as well as for Kyo in case she felt like making a rude comment again. Luckily, the street they were walking on was relatively free of zombies hanging around. And Kyo was busy in front of the group, being extra vigilant for the special infected Mio had told her about.

"I know that you yelled at Tainaka-san, and you regret it...but don't you want to save your other friends too?"

"Of course I do!" Mio nodded enthusiastically. "If any of them...didn't make it...whether it be Ritsu, Mugi, Yui, Azusa, or Ui...I'd be incredibly sad."

"Oh, alright then. I'm sorry I asked, but I was just curious. Your mind seems to be focused on this Tainaka-san so much."

"Well, we have been best friends since early childhood..."

"I see… but you've also been friends with your club members for quite a while now as well. I hope we'll be able to save the entirety of the Light Music Club, despite how difficult of a task it might seem at the moment," Suki smiled reassuringly.

"Yeah, I hope so too..." _Suki made a good point...I love everybody in the Light Music Club, not just that idiot Ritsu. I'd be completely devastated if I found any one of them to have..._clearly, the thought of any of her friends in a deceased status unraveled the bassist.

Mio instantly turned around when a thunderous roar pierced the contrasting peaceful and clear night sky.

"Err, looks like you're going to have to cut your reminiscing short Mio-chan," Kyo spoke.

"Oh? You do actually know my name?" Mio questioned with a hint of sarcasm despite the fear of whatever monstrous mutant zombie was behind them.

"Oh, just raise your katana in a fighting stance damn it. This big guy doesn't sound like he's kidding around…"

The roar continued to resonate across the lengthy and wide street the trio was trekking, its volume increasing. The sound of buildings being crushed and cars being overturned frightened the girls, but they were able to remain vigilant.

"Um…Mio-chan," Suki suddenly said. "Shouldn't we be trying to get away from this monster…?"

"Oh come on Suki-chan, no monster can handle the power of the Occult Club!" Kyo stated with confidence.

"If you're in an Occult Club, shouldn't you have some super spell that should be able to take some of these things out?" Mio asked.

"Hey, I already said the spell book is in the graveyard with that other dead girl! We can't reverse this zombie apocalypse until we finally get that book!"

"That reminds me, you still haven't told me why you lent the book to her in the first place…"

"I already told you, it's because SHUT UP."

"Stop arguing you two, let's just run already!" With that statement, the girls followed Mio's advice and began to book it like Hell across the street.

The giant zombie's figure was now visible upon the horizon. It was on a rampage, running blindly into buildings with one arm stretched in front of it and another covering one of its eyes. All the while, it was yelling loudly in pain. Any normal infected that were in its path were instantly trampled into the pavement.

"What in Hell is that thing?" Kyo shouted while running.

"Well, it's big, and kind of killing everything in its path, so just stay away from it!" Suki replied.

All the while, the normal infected spotted these girls running away from them, so their only instinct was to follow them with their arms dangling at their sides and their jaws expanded further than human anatomy would allow.

Of course, since all the girls had were melee weapons, they couldn't slash and bash their way through these infected, especially with that monster barely resembling a real zombie closing in on them.

"Dear God…" The navy-haired girl couldn't utter any other expression between her breaths as the humongous alien-like mutant charged toward the girls in blind fury and rage.

"Just keep running!"

"Oh yeah Mio, _that's_ certainly a helpful tip!"

"Kyo, how about _you_ shut up!"

* * *

The brunette watched carefully through the iron sights of her assault rifle. The name of the game in most shooters was "Shoot anything that moves." Such a tactic couldn't be put to use here, since conservation of ammo was a necessity. Still, if any zombie moved in close enough to dare bite any of her friends, even so much as lay one of their dirty fingers on them…

"I'd send those bitches back to Hell where they belong…" Ritsu stated sternly as she found a few targets in front of her shuffling around uselessly, unaware of the trio's presence.

Suddenly, Ritsu heard laughter from behind. Swirling her gun around, she pointed her rifle at Tsumugi, who was giggling in as polite a manner as possible. "Mugi, what's so funny?"

"Hehe, I'm sorry Ricchan," the blonde replied. "It's just that line sounded like one of those one-liners used in action movies! It was so cool!~" Her blue eyes began to sparkle as the other two remembered how rich girls were either stuck-up or airheaded. Ritsu decided to leave the conversation at that and return to walking toward her three other targets.

"Ritsu-senpai, do you even know where you're going?"

"Why of course I do!"

"Honestly…?" Azusa gave the drummer a skeptical look.

"… Well, uh...err...no."

"Senpai, really though?"

"How about you take this gun and lead us through this forest? Oh right, you can't because you voted me to be your leader, so just follow me damn it."

"Point taken…" The junior grumbled while picking up one of the frying pans acquired at the Hirasawa's.

"Mugi, you ready?"

The blonde nodded enthusiastically with a pan of her own raised near her shoulders. "Are you ready to save Mio-chan, Ricchan?"

The brunette whose bangs had fallen over one of her eyes didn't reply with words. She replied with action.

The sound of bullets making contact with flesh of an undead victim. An undead victim who had fallen to the Houkago Tea Time's leader.

"Duh," she said with a small smirk.

"Uh…Ritsu-senpai…"

"Hm, what is it Azusa?"

"…Take your finger off the trigger."

"Oh! My bad!" Ritsu mentally face-palmed after ceasing the weapon from firing. "So much for conserving our ammo, eh?" She threw up a peace sign for consolation.

Once again, Azusa sighed while wondering _why_ she and Tsumugi let her be the leader. At that moment, the cries of many normal infected echoed through the forest, gradually getting louder as both their growls and footsteps neared.

"Um, Ricchan…" Mugi said with slight hesitance. "We might have a bit of unwanted company…"

"Yeah, thanks for the reminder Mugi," Ritsu deadpanned. "Nothing's ever easy in a zombie apocalypse, huh…?"

* * *

Nothing was ever easy for Ritsu, and things certainly weren't easy for Mio, Suki, and Kyo. They had been running for Kami-sama knows how long, and their legs were beginning to tire out. They tried crossing into the alleyways, slashing up a few infected who stood in their way to clear a path.

However, the alleys somehow always led back to the main road, the same main road the Tank was causing miniature earthquakes on. Mio made a mental note to become more familiar with her own city.

To make matters worse, the number of infected behind them increased from three or so zombies to a full-blown horde of maybe thirty or so undead.

"Mio-chan, my legs are starting to get tired!" Suki whined as her pace was quickly slowing.

"Come on Suki, we can't afford to stop and rest! The horde behind us would k-kill us!"

"I don't think…I can go any longer…" The long-haired brunette dropped her pan as her legs tripped over each other. Everything happened in slow motion as her vision began to blur. The horde of zombies behind her was slowly becoming a bigger and bigger mish-mash of gray.

"NO! I'm not going to leave you behind!"

Gasping, Suki felt her body being lifted onto someone's shoulders. "K-Kyo-chan…" she was barely able to mutter from fatigue.

"I can't just leave you behind, Suki-chan…" Mio took a moment to marvel at Kyo's close friendship with Suki, before remind her of the impending doom behind them. "Right, let's get going!"

The pair speeded off with Suki resting on Kyo's shoulders. Despite the weight added to her back, Kyo kept her speed above that of the horde and Tank behind them.

Memories of Suki's childhood flashed in her mind as she felt the wind whipping through her hair.

"_Kyo-chan…why are you so mean to me at school, but nice to me when it's just us? I don't quite understand."_

Mio was busy in the front pushing any infected to the side with the handle of her katana, feeling slightly impressed at how well she was adapting to this weapon.

"_Hey, I have an image to uphold at school! I'm known as the mean girl, and acting nice to you will ruin my reputation!"_

Suki's weight was becoming a huge burden on the other girl's back.

"_But…I like you when you're nice…it makes me feel…happier."_

Kyo felt the girl slipping from her shoulders.

"_Well yeah, we are friends, right? Just remember that under all of that mean-ness I show, I really do care for you!"_

With the newfound adrenaline, she grabbed her friend's arms and grasped Suki before she fell onto the ground again.

"Thanks…for always helping me…" Suki muttered near inaudibly, yet enough for Kyo to hear.

The latter smirked at the comment. "You couldn't just leave me with Mio over there, right? Some zombie would get us while we were arguing."

* * *

Notified of Azusa, Tsumugi, and Ritsu's presence, every one of the infected shuffled their legs toward the threesome.

Ritsu, being the courageous type of leader but also the leader that makes shit up while she goes, led the other two members of the band in a random direction, shooting any of the zombies that lay in the path ahead.

Azusa kept close to her headband-less senpai, smacking any zombies that dare come close enough to harm her. Such zombies' efforts were met with a blunt blow of cold steel metal to the face, blood streaming on the ground, trees, and Azusa's uniform. Of course, such a small detail as a bloodied-up uniform could be shrugged off easily as long as she survived with her senpai's intact.

Tsumugi was beginning to grow accustomed to fighting zombies, and even found pleasure in killing them in more creative ways than just hitting them with a mere pan. Of course, she still kept her pace equal to Ritsu's and Azusa's, but she soon found herself slapping the zombie's face against the bark of a tree, elbowing one in the neck, and straight up knocking one out with a strong punch to the face.

"Nice one Mugi!" Ritsu called out after the ojou-sama crashed the cooking utensil against a zombie that had almost bitten the brunette.

Despite them being normal high school girls in every possible way, they were faring well in a zombie apocalypse so far.

"Ritsu-senpai!" While running, she turned her head around at Azusa's exclamation to find even more normal infected on their tail. Looking back in front of her, she found a large number of normal infected surrounding them.

"Eh…crap, Azusa, what do we do?" Ritsu panicked.

"How should I know, you're the leader!"

"Hey, you're the most level-headed and smartest person in the club next to Mio! Think of something!"

The zombies were rapidly closing the distance, each of them eager to acquire a tasty human meal.

Despite how much the twin-tailed guitarist strained her brain, she was too pressured to properly think of a way out of the situation. All the while, she was still arguing with Ritsu.

"Azusa-chan, Ricchan, the trees!" The two of them looked at the keyboardist and then at her index finger pointing at the treetops above. "Let's try climbing up there!"

Tsumugi made her way up first, willing to give up her weapon since she wasn't able to climb with it. She reached her hand toward Ritsu from a high branch, while the drummer's other hand held on tightly to the assault rifle.

Azusa felt extremely pressed for time as she could literally feel Death coming to drag her into its chambers of Hell. "Senpai, please hurry up!" She shouted as one of the nearer zombies grabbed her hair ties off of her, letting the junior's obsidian hair flow freely on her back.

"Azusa-chan, grab my hand!" Looking up, Azusa immediately jumped for the outstretched arm, her left hand desperately trying to make contact with Tsumugi's.

Their hands grasped each other, but not before pain suddenly erupted in Azusa's thigh. "Agh, my leg!" she screamed out in agony, dropping her own pan in the process.

"Azusa!" Ritsu called out, and let her rage release itself in one giant flurry of bullets. With skill that she never knew she had, the drummer took out many of the infected with well placed headshots.

As soon as all of them were high up in the trees and safe from their predators, Tsumugi and Ritsu took the time to inspect Azusa's leg wound.

"Oh my…" Tsumugi mouthed as she and Ritsu gaped at the wound. Three noticeably large scratch marks had been etched across the junior's leg, blood seeping out onto the branch and coloring it a sickly red. "Azusa-chan, can you move?"

"I-It burns…but I should be able to move…"

"Ergh, a stupid Hunter must have got her," Ritsu said bluntly. "Doesn't look like a bite mark, but it must have been able to graze her leg with its claws."

While they were inspecting the wound, the growls below reminded them how they needed to get out of there for any help.

"Azusa, you think you'll be okay?" Concern was etched all over Ritsu's face. "You can move, right?"

"Don't worry senpai, I'm injured, not near death." The guitarist smiled back at her leader in assurance.

"We should be able to jump across these branches and get out, right Ricchan?" Tsumugi stated, followed by Ritsu nodding.

"Yeah. Alright Azusa, if you need any help, ask me or Mugi to carry you on our backs, okay?"

"Thank you two…but I think I'll be just fine.

* * *

It was pure luck; absolute pure luck that the girls were able to shake off the gigantic horde that accumulated behind them, along with the Tank.

They had come across an extremely narrow alley. While they were running through it, Mio kicked a garbage container across the alley and into the zombies, effectively knocking them back.

Eventually, they managed to lose the undead army without losing any blood or limbs, which was quite an accomplishment for the high school girls.

"Heh, when I apply for a college…" Kyo said between breaths. "I'll be damn sure to put this on my resume…"

Now on the floor and gaining a little strength back, Suki replied "Just tell me what college that is, and I'll be sure to follow you there all the way."

Again, Mio admired their close friendship, yet it made her yearn to be reunited with her own best friend.

"It'd be delightful if Mio-chan could join us as well, right?" Suki grinned at the bassist, in which the latter returned the gesture.

"For Suki, of course. Kyo might be a deal breaker though." The three began laughing at Mio's joke, happy that they were able to survive through such a situation.

Unexpectedly, the trio heard multiple explosions erupting not too far from their currently location. In fact, from the alley way they were currently residing in, Mio could see a few corpses fly past them.

It was then that the bassist heard a familiar song play.

A song that was played at a certain wedding reception.

A song that a certain teacher played in a certain band.

"_LOVE…_" Mio whispered. "That can't possibly be…"

The death metal voice that sang along with the song confirmed her suspicions. "It's her!" the raven-haired girl suddenly yelled.

"What? I can't hear you, some idiot is playing death metal too loudly."

"No Kyo, that's _her_!" The pair of best friends only looked at Mio in confusion. She felt like face-palming at them even though it was completely reasonable that she wasn't being clear enough.

"It's Sawako-sensei, my homeroom teacher!"

"Really?" Suki and Kyo questioned simultaneously.

"Trust me, I know the voice of the woman who has gotten me into many cosplay outfits. Hurry, let's get over there!"

A misunderstanding expression took on their faces for a second, but they soon followed Mio in suit.

_If Sawako-sensei's here…maybe Ritsu's there with her!_

* * *

"HAHA! Forest of the Marathon, you have been conquered!"

Azusa didn't even feel like deadpanning at the victory comment; she joined both seniors in celebrating the fact that they were to escape the forest of undead death and back outside where they could finally see the night sky clearly.

Unfortunately, Ritsu had lost her SCAR assault rifle while traversing the various trees, but she found living unarmed to be much more preferable than living without an arm.

"Azusa-chan, are you still okay?" Tsumugi asked.

"Yes, I'm fine. My leg is still burning intensely, but it's nothing life-threatening." Azusa couldn't help but beam brightly, feeling that all of the girls were going to make it out alive.

"Alright, before we move on troop," Ritsu began. "I just wanted to say thanks for the encouragement back there again. Without that, I would have been zombie dinner, hehe. Really though, thanks so mu-"

Before she brunette had a chance to finish, a chain of explosions sounded nearby.

"Argh, that completely ruined my mood!" Ritsu complained.

"It's okay Ricchan, we're just thankful that we're all still together!" Tsumugi's smile instantly calmed the drummer's nerves.

However, such nerves were soon excited after hearing a familiar metal song play in the distance.

"Ricchan, isn't that…Sawako-sensei's song _LOVE_…?"

A recognizable scream pierced their ears, rattling their brains up and down in their skulls.

"Yes Mugi-senpai, there's no mistaking it!"

"That must be Sawa-chan! I completely forgot about her! Maybe Mio's with her! Come on girls, stop standing around, hurry up already!"

Before they had a chance to fathom the fact that their teacher was alive and that Mio could possibly be with her, Ritsu had taken off at full speed toward the direction of the guitar shredding.

"Mio…I'll _finally _get to see you again! And apologize for how much of an idiot I've been!"

* * *

**A/N**: Majestic mucus has been out of commission for reasons I honestly don't know, so I was also desperately searching for a replacement beta-reader. Surprisingly, my friend in real life agreed to beta for me, and I'm very grateful for her help. She wanted me to credit her as "VD", so thank you VD.

Anyway, reviews and criticisms are appreciated but of course, not demanded.

**NEXT CHAPTER**: the members of the Light Music Club finally reunite, Sawako explains how she's one of the freaks who have long awaited a zombie apocalypse, and all of the girls somehow squish into the teacher's tiny mini-van and anger her to the point of wanting to brutally murder all of them with an assortment of weapons she inexplicably wields to make her even more badass.


End file.
